THE  SINS 

OF  THE 
CHILDREN 


COSMO  HAMILTON 


THE    SINS    OF    THE    CHILDREN 


Cosmo  Hamilton 


THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 
THE  BLINDNESS  OF  VIRTUE 
THE  DOOR   THAT  HAS   NO   KEY 
THE  MIRACLE  OF  LOVE 

A     PLEA     FOR     THE     YOUNGER 
GENERATION 


And  over  them  both  .  .  .  hung  the  moon  and  stars. 
FRONTISPIECE.    See  page  34. 


THE  SINS  OF  THE 
CHILDREN 


A  NOVEL 


BY 
COSMO    HAMILTON 


WITH  FRONTISPIECE  BY 

GEORGE  O.    BAKER 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,    BROWN,   AND    COMPANY 
1916 


Copyright,  1916, 
BY  COSMO  HAMILTON. 

All  rights  reserved 
Published,  October,  1916 


THE  COLONIAL  PRESS 
C.  H.  SIMOND8  CO.,  BOSTON,  U.  8.  A. 


To 

MY  WIFE 


2130040 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PART  ONE  — YOUTH  •  »  •  •  •  l 
PART  TWO  — THE  CITY  .  i1  ...  99 
PART  THREE  — LIFE  .  .  .221 


PART  ONE 
YOUTH 


THE  SINS  OF 
THE  CHILDREN 


WHEN  Peter  Guthrie  laughed  the  rooks  stirred  on 
the  old  trees  behind  the  Bodleian  and  the  bored  cab- 
drivers  who  lolled  in  uncomfortable  attitudes  on  their 
cabs  in  St.  Giles  perked  up  their  heads. 

He  threw  open  his  door  one  morning  and  leaving 
one  of  these  laughs  of  his  rolling  round  the  quad  of 
St.  John's  College  found  the  recumbent  form  of  Nicho- 
las Kenyon  all  among  his  cushions  as  usual,  and  as 
usual  smoking  his  cigarettes  and  reading  his  maga- 
zines. The  words  "  as  usual "  seemed  to  be  stamped 
on  his  forehead. 

"  What  d'you  think  ?  "  cried  Peter,  filling  the  room 
like  a  thirty-mile  gale. 

"  You  ought  to  know  that  I  don't  think.  It's  a  form 
of  exercise  that  I  never  indulge  in."  Kenyon  lit  a 
fresh  cigarette  from  the  one  which  he  had  half -smoked 
and  with  peculiar  expertness  flicked  the  end  out  of  the 
window  into  St.  Giles  Street,  which  ran  past  the  great 
gates  of  the  college.  He  hoped  that  it  might  have 
fallen  on  somebody's  head,  but  he  didn't  get  up  to  see. 


4  THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Well,"  said  Peter,  "  I  was  coming  down  the  High 
just  now  and  an  awful  pretty  girl  passed  with  a  Univ. 
man.  She  looked  at  me  —  thereby  very  nearly  laying 
me  flat  on  my  face  —  and  I  heard  her  ask,  '  Who's 
that  ?  '  It  was  the  man's  answer  that  makes  me  laugh. 
He  said :  '  Oh,  he's  only  a  Rhodes  scholar ! '  "  And 
off  he  went  again. 

Nicholas  Kenyon  raised  his  immaculate  person  a  few 
inches  and  looked  round  at  his  friend.  The  Harvard 
man,  with  his  six-foot-one  of  excellent  muscles  and 
sinews,  his  square  shoulders  and  deep  chest,  and  his 
fine,  honest,  alert  and  healthy  face,  made  most  people 
ask  who  he  was.  "If  I'd  been  you,"  said  Kenyon, 
"  I  should  have  made  a  mental  note  of  that  Univ. 
blighter  in  order  to  land  him  one  the  next  time  you 
saw  him,  that  he  wouldn't  easily  forget." 

"Why?  I  liked  it,  from  a  man  of  his  type.  I've 
been  'only  a  damned  Rhodes  scholar'  to  all  the  little 
pussy  purr-purrs  ever  since  I  first  walked  the  High  in 
my  American-made  clothes.  I  owe  that  fellow  no 
grudge;  and  if  I  meet  that  girl  again  —  which  I  shall 
make  a  point  of  doing  —  I  bet  you  anything  you  like 
that  his  scoffing  remark  will  lend  a  touch  of  romance 
to  me  which  will  be  worth  a  lot." 

"  Was  she  something  out  of  the  ordinary?  " 

"  Quite,"  said  Peter. 

He  hung  his  straw  hat  on  the  electric  bulb,  threw  off 
his  coat,  rolled  up  his  sleeves  and  started  to  tidy  up  his 
rooms  with  more  energy  and  deftness  than  is  possessed 
by  the  average  housemaid.  He  flicked  the  little  pile 
of  cigarette  ash,  which  Kenyon  had  dropped  on  the 


YOUTH  5 

floor,  into  a  corner.  He  gathered  the  weekly  illus- 
trated papers  which  Kenyon  had  flung  aside  and  put 
them  on  a  back  shelf,  and  then  he  picked  up  the  man 
Kenyon  in  his  arms,  deposited  him  in  a  wide  arm- 
chair in  front  of  the  fireplace  and  started  punching  all 
the  cushions. 

Kenyon  looked  ineffably  bored.  "  Good  God !  "  he 
said.  "What's  all  this  energy?  You  shatter  my 
nervous  system." 

"  My  dear  chap,"  said  Peter,  "  you  seem  to  forget 
that  this  is  Commem.  and  that  my  people  have  come 
three  thousand  miles  to  see  their  little  Peter  in  his  little 
rooms.  I'm  therefore  polishing  up  the  knocker  of  the 
big  front  door.  My  mother  has  a  tidy  mind  and  I 
want  my  father  to  gain  the  impression  that  I'm  me- 
thodical and  responsible.  He  has  a  quick  eye.  They 
wired  me  from  London  last  night  to  say  that  they'll  be 
here  at  five  o'clock  to  tea.  I  dashed  round  to  the  Ran- 
dolph early  this  morning  to  book  rooms  for  them. 
Gee,  it's  a  big  party,  too !  I  can't  make  out  why  they 
want  so  many  rooms.  It'll  be  like  my  sister  to  have 
brought  over  one  of  her  school  friends.  I  guess  I 
shall  be  darned  glad  to  see  them,  anyway." 

There  was  a  touch  of  excitement  in  the  boy's  voice, 
and  his  sun-tanned,  excellent  face  showed  the  delight 
that  he  felt.  He  had  not  seen  his  mother,  brother  and 
sister  for  two  years,  having  spent  his  vacations  in 
England. 

Nicholas  Kenyon  got  up  slowly.  He  did  every- 
thing slowly.  "  Well,"  he  said,  "  I  thank  God  that 
my  people  don't  bother  me  on  these  festive  occasions. 


6  THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

To  my  way  of  thinking  the  influx  of  fathers  and 
mothers  into  Oxford  makes  the  whole  place  provincial. 
However,  I  can  understand  your  childish  glee.  You 
are  pretty  badly  dipped,  I  understand,  and  with  the 
true  psychology  of  the  rasping  undergraduate  you  are 
first  going  to  throw  the  glamour  of  the  city  of  spires 
over  your  untravelled  parent  and  then  touch  him  for 
a  fairly  considerable  cheque." 

Peter  gave  a  sort  of  laugh.  "  Touch  my  father !  " 
he  said.  "  Not  much,  I  shall  put  my  case  up  to  my 
mother.  She's  the  one  who  does  these  little  things." 

Kenyon  was  faintly  interested.  Being  perennially 
impecunious  himself  and  unable  to  raise  money  even 
from  the  loan  sharks,  he  looked  to  the  advent  of  Peter's 
parents  to  bring  him  at  least  fifty  pounds.  He  always 
borrowed  from  Peter. 

"  Oh,  I  see,"  he  said.  "  It's  the  old  lady  who  car- 
ries the  money-bags,  is  it  ?  " 

"  No,  it  isn't,"  said  Peter;  "  but  as  a  matter  of  fact 
I  never  have  gone  to  my  father  for  anything  and  I 
don't  think  I  ever  shall.  I  don't  know  why  it  is,  but 
none  of  us  have  ever  been  able  to  screw  up  courage  to 
say  more  than  *  Good-morning  '  and  '  Good-night '  to 
the  Governor,  although  of  course  we  all  think  he  is  a 
very  wonderful  person." 

Kenyon  yawned.  "I  see,"  he  said.  "Bad  luck. 
I  should  hate  to  have  such  a  disagreeable  devil  for  a 
father  —  one  of  the  martinet  type,  who  says  don't  all 
the  time  when  he  ought  to  say  do,  and  makes  home  a 
sort  of  pocket-hell  for  everybody." 

Peter  twisted  round  and  spoke  quickly  and  rather 


YOUTH  7 

warmly.  "  So  should  I,"  he  said,  "  but  luckily  I 
haven't.  I  didn't  want  to  suggest  that  my  father  was 
that  type  of  man.  He's  one  of  the  very  best  —  one  of 
the  men  who  count  for  something  in  my  country. 
He's  worked  like  a  dog  to  give  us  a  chance  in  life  and 
his  generosity  makes  me  personally  sometimes  feel  al- 
most indecent.  I  mean  that  I  feel  that  I  have  taken 
advantage  of  him, —  but  —  but,  somehow  or  other, — 
oh,  I  don't  know, —  we  don't  seem  to  know  each  other 
—  that's  all.  He  hasn't  the  knack  of  winning  our 
confidence  —  or  something.  So  it  comes  to  this :  when 
we  want  anything  we  ask  mother  and  she  gets  it  for  us. 
That's  all  there's  to  it.  And  look  here,  Nick,  I  want 
you  to  be  frightfully  nice  to  the  Governor.  Get  out 
of  your  ice-box  and  warm  up  to  the  old  man.  I  can't, 
you  see ;  but  as  he  has  come  all  this  way  to  look  me  up 
I  want  somebody  to  show  some  appreciation." 

With  his  eyes  to  the  small  relief  which  the  visit  of 
Dr.  Hunter  Guthrie,  of  New  York  City,  might  bring 
him,  Nicholas  Kenyon  nodded.  "  Rely  on  me,"  he 
said.  "  Butter  shan't  melt  in  my  mouth;  and  before 
your  father  leaves  Oxford  I'll  make  him  feel  that  he's 
been  created  a  Baronet  and  appointed  Physician  in 
Ordinary  to  His  Majesty  the  King.  Well,  so  long, 
Peter !  I'm  lunching  with  Lascelles  at  the  House  this 
morning.  I'll  drop  in  to  tea  and  hand  cakes  round  to 
your  beloved  family." 

"  Right-o,"  said  Peter.  "  That'll  be  great!  "  And 
when  the  door  closed  and  he  found  himself  alone  he 
arranged  a  certain  number  of  silver  cups  which  he  had 
won  in  athletics  all  along  his  mantel-piece,  for  his 


8          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

father  to  see,  gazed  at  them  for  a  moment  with  a  half- 
smile  of  rather  self -conscious,  pride,  finished  tidying 
his  room,  gazed  affectionately  for  a  few  moments  at 
the  familiar  sight  of  Pusey  House  through  the  leaf- 
crowded  trees  that  lined  the  sunny  street,  and  then  sat 
down  to  his  piano  and  played  a  rag-time  with  all  that 
perfect  excellence  and  sense  of  rhythm  which  had 
opened  the  most  insular  doors  to  him  during  his  first 
days  as  a  fresher. 

II 

THIS  fine  big  fellow,  Peter  Murray  Guthrie,  who 
had  done  immensely  well  at  Harvard  in  athletics  and 
was  by  no  means  a  fool  intellectually,  could  afford  to 
be  amused  at  the  fact  that  he  had  been  scoffingly  re- 
ferred to  as  "  only  a  Rhodes  scholar."  He  had  been 
born  under  a  lucky  star  and  he  had  that  wonderful 
gymnastic  faculty  of  always  falling  on  his  feet.  If 
with  all  his  suspicions  aroused  he  had  gone  up  to  Ox- 
ford in  the  same  rather  timid,  self-conscious,  on-the- 
defensive  manner  of  the  average  Rhodes  scholar  who 
expected  to  be  treated  as  a  creature  quite  different 
from  the  English  undergraduate,  he  would  have  found 
his  way  to  the  American  Club  and  stayed  there  more 
or  less  permanently,  taking  very  little  part  in  the  glori- 
ous multitudinous  life  of  the  freshmen  of  his  college, 
and  remained  a  sort  of  pariah  of  his  own  making. 
Freshmen  themselves,  the  Lord  knows,  are  forlorn 
enough.  Everything  is  strange  to  them,  too, —  so- 
ciety, rules,  customs,  unwritten  laws  and  faces. 


YOUTH  9 

They  are  solitary  creatures  in  the  midst  of  a  bustling 
crowd.  If  they  do  not  come  from  one  of  the  great 
public  schools  and  meet  again  the  men  they  knew  there 
their  chance  of  making  friends  is  small  and  for  many 
dull  disappointing  weeks  they  must  mope  and  look-on 
and  envy  and  find  their  feet  alone,  suffering,  poor 
devils,  from  a  hideous  sheepishness  and  wondering, 
with  a  sort  of  morbid  self-consciousness,  what  others 
are  thinking  of  them.  But  Peter  was  unafraid.  He 
stalked  into  Oxford  prepared  to  find  it  the  finest  place 
on  earth  —  with  his  imagination  stirred  at  the  sight 
of  those  old  colleges  whose  quadrangles  echoed  with 
the  feet  of  the  great  dead  and  rang  with  those  of  the 
younger  generation  to  whom  life  was  a  great  adven- 
ture and  who  might  spring  from  those  old  stones  into 
everlasting  fame.  He  strode  through  the  gate  of  St. 
John's  with  his  chin  high,  prepared  to  serve  her  with 
all  his  strength  and  all  the  best  of  his  youth  and  leave 
her  finally  unsullied  by  his  name.  He  didn't  give  a 
single  whoop  for  all  this  talk  about  the  snobbishness 
and  insularity  of  English  undergraduates.  He  didn't 
believe  that  he  would  find  a  college  divided  and  sub- 
divided into  sets;  and  if  the  statement  proved  to  be 
true  —  well,  he  intended  to  break  all  the  barriers  down. 
Therefore,  with  such  a  spirit  added  to  his  fine  frank, 
manly  personality,  irresistible  laugh,  great  big  friendly 
hand  and  the  rumours  that  came  with  him  of  his  bull- 
like  rushes  on  the  football  field,  he  became  at  once  a 
marked  man.  Second-year  and  even  third-year  men 
nudged  each  other  when  he  passed.  "  By  Jove !  "  they 
said.  "  That's  a  useful  looking  cove !  We  must  get 


io         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

him  down  to  the  river."  Or,  "  I  wonder  if  that 
American  can  be  taught  to  play  cricket?  "  As  for  the 
freshers  —  all  as  frightened  as  a  lot  of  rabbits  far 
away  from  their  warren  —  they  gazed  with  shy  ad- 
miration and  respect  at  Peter,  who,  expecting  no  re- 
buffs, received  none. 

Finding  that  he  could  not  live  in  college  until  he  was 
a  second-year  man,  Peter  had  looked  about  him  among 
the  freshers  for  a  likely  person  with  whom  to  share 
rooms.  He  had  come  up  in  the  train  with  Nicholas 
Kenyon,  whose  shell  he  had  insisted  upon  opening. 
He,  too,  was  entered  at  St.  John's  and  was  very  ready 
—  being  impecunious  —  to  share  lodgings  with  the 
American  whose  allowance  he  might  share  and  whose 
personality  was  distinctly  unusual.  These  two  then 
gravitated  to  Beaumont  Street,  captured  a  large  sit- 
ting-room and  two  bed-rooms  on  the  ground  floor,  and 
from  the  first  evening  of  their  arrival  were  perfectly 
at  home.  Peter  at  once  hired  a  piano  from  a  music 
shop  in  the  High  which  he  quickly  discovered,  bought 
several  bottles  of  whiskey  and  a  thousand  cigarettes, 
besides  several  pounds  of  pipe  tobacco,  threw  open  his 
window,  and  as  soon  as  dinner  was  over  started  play- 
ing rag-times. 

Kenyon  had  been  interested  and  amused.  He  had 
not  expected  to  find  himself  "  herding,"  as  he  put  it, 
with  a  damned  Rhodes  scholar.  He  took  it  for 
granted  that  these  "  foreigners  "  would  live  apart  from 
the  ordinary  undergraduate,  as  uncouth  people  should. 
He  had  been  quick  to  notice,  however, —  psychology 
being  his  principal  stock  in  trade,— that  Peter  had 


YOUTH  ii 

made  an  instant  impression;  and  as  he  sat  on  the  win- 
dow-sill listening  with  what  he  had  to  confess  to  him- 
self was  keen  pleasure  to  Peter's  masterly  manipulation 
of  the  piano  and  saw  all  the  windows  within  near 
range  of  their  house  open  and  heads  poke  out  to  listen, 
he  was  able  —  without  any  propheticism  —  to  say  that 
Peter  would  quickly  be  the  centre  of  a  set.  He  would 
certainly  not  be  sulking  in  the  American  Club. 

Very  quickly  P.  M.  Guthrie,  of  St.  John's,  became 
"  Peter "  to  the  whole  college  —  and  stroke  in  the 
freshers'  boat.  The  other  Rhodes  scholars  owed 
everything  that  was  good  to  him.  He  stood  by  them 
loyally,  made  his  rooms  their  headquarters,  and  all 
who  wanted  to  know  him  were  obliged  to  know  them. 
He  introduced  swipes  at  the  first  freshers'  concert  in 
the  Hall,  with  enormous  success,  selecting  Forbes 
Nicholl,  of  Brasenose;  Watson  Frick,  of  Wadham; 
Baldwin  Colgate,  of  Worcester;  and  Madison  Smith, 
of  Merton,  all  good  Americans,  for  the  purpose. 
Even  Dons  stayed  to  listen  on  that  epoch-making  oc- 
casion and  the  fame  of  their  curious  and  delightful 
method  of  singing  spread  all  over  the  university.  It 
was  easy.  There  was  nothing  else  like  it. 

Quite  unconsciously  Peter  was  for  a  little  while  the 
whole  topic  of  conversation  at  Dons'  dinners.  These 
hide-bound  professors  were  really  quite  surprised  at 
the  remarkable  way  in  which,  at  one  fell  swoop,  this 
man  Peter  Guthrie  had  managed  to  weld  together  the 
English  and  American  undergraduates  for  the  first 
time  in  their  knowledge.  Some  of  them  put  it  all 
down  to  his  piano  playing  —  and  were  very  nearly 


12         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

right.  Others  conceived  his  great  laugh  to  be  mainly 
responsible  —  and  were  not  far  short  of  the  mark. 
But  it  was  Nicholas  Kenyon,  the  psychologist,  who 
put  his  finger  on  the  whole  truth  of  this  swift  and  un- 
believable success.  He  said  that  it  was  Peter's  hu- 
manity which  had  conquered  Oxford,  and  in  so  doing 
proved  —  impecunious  only  son  of  an  absolutely  broke 
peer  as  he  was  —  that  he  would  be  able  to  make  a  very 
fair  living  in  the  future  on  his  wits.  It  may  be  said 
that  he  never  intended  to  work. 

It  was  part  of  Peter's  honesty  and  simplicity  to  re- 
main American.  He  made  no  effort  to  ape  the  Ox- 
ford manner  of  speech.  He  would  see  himself  shot 
before  he  got  into  the  rather  effeminate  clothes  af- 
fected by  the  Oxford  man.  He  continued  to  be  nat- 
ural, to  remain  himself,  and  not  to  take  on  the  colors 
chameleon-wise  of  those  about  him.  His  Stetson  hat 
was  the  standing  joke  of  St.  John's.  Nevertheless, 
there  was  not  one  man  in  the  college  who  would  not 
have  hit  hard  if  any  derogatory  remarks  had  been 
thrown  at  the  head  inside  it.  His  padded  shoulders, 
upholstered  ties  and  narrow  belt  were  all  frequently 
caricatured,  but  the  sound  of  Peter's  laugh  gathered 
men  together  like  the  music  of  the  Pied  Piper  of  Ham- 
elin.  It  was  just  that  this  man  Peter  Guthrie  was  a 
man  that  made  him  not  only  accepted  in  a  place  seeth- 
ing with  quaint  and  foolish  habits,  out-of-date  shib- 
boleths and  curious  unwritten  laws,  but  loved  and  re- 
spected. Here  was  one  to  whom  merely  to  live  was 
a  joy.  To  the  despondent  he  came  therefore  as  a 
tonic.  He  exuded  breeziness  filled  with  ozone.  His 


YOUTH  13 

continuous  high  spirits  infected  even  those  foolish  boys 
who  were  encrusted  with  affectation  and  stuccoed  with 
the  petty  side  and  insolence  of  Eton.  He  worked 
hard  and  played  hard  and  slept  like  a  dog,  ate  hearty 
and  drank  like  a  thirsty  plant.  Also  he  smoked  like 
a  factory  chimney.  He  had  no  crankish  views  —  no 
tolerance  for  "  isms,"  and  was  not  ashamed  to  stride 
into  chapel  and  say  his  prayers  like  a  simple  boy.  In 
short,  "  unashamed  "  was  his  watchword,  and  he  had 
been  endowed  with  the  rare  gift  of  saying  "  No,"  and 
sticking  to  it.  And  to  Nicholas  Kenyon,  who  fre- 
quented the  rooms  of  the  so-called  intellectuals  —  those 
"  little  dreadful  clever  people  "  who  parroted  and  per- 
verted other  men's  thoughts  and  possessed  no  origi- 
nality of  their  own  —  it  was  a  stroke  of  genius  on 
Peter's  part  to  have  nothing  but  the  photographs  of  his 
family  all  over  his  rooms.  He  must  be  a  big  man, 
Nicholas  said  to  himself,  who  could  afford,  among  the 
very  young,  to  dispense  with  the  female  form  divine 
in  his  frames  —  the  nudes  so  generally  placed  in 
them  —  in  order  to  convey  the  impression  of  being 
devilish  wise  and  bad.  Also  it  showed,  according  to 
this  human  merchant,  a  peculiar  strength  of  character 
on  Peter's  part  to  bolt  his  door  regularly  one  evening 
a  week  so  that  he  might  sit  down  uninterrupted  and 
write  a  tremendous  screed  to  his  mother.  However, 
that  was  Peter  the  man-boy  —  Peter  the  Rhodes 
scholar  —  Peter  the  Oxford  man  —  who  always 
wound  up  his  musical  evenings  with  the  "  Star  Span- 
gled Banner."  And  there  was  just  one  other  side  to 
this  big,  simple  fellow's  character  which  puzzled  and 


I4          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

annoyed  the  bloodless,  clever  parasite  who  lived  with 
him  and  upon  him, —  women. 

Now,  Nicholas  Kenyon  —  the  Honourable  Nicholas 
Augustus  Fitzhugh  Kenyon  —  was  a  patron  of  the 
drama.  That  is  to  say,  he  had  the  right  somehow  to 
enter  the  stage  door  of  the  Theatre  Royal  at  all  times, 
and  did  so  whenever  the  theatre  was  visited  by  a  musi- 
cal comedy  company.  He  was  known  Jo  innumerable 
chorus  girls  as  "  Boy-dear,"  and  made' a  point  of  en- 
tertaining them  at  luncheon  and  supper  during  their 
visits  to  the  university  town.  He  brought  choice 
specimens  of  this  breed  to  Beaumont  Street  for  tea 
and  tittle-tattle  and  introduced  them  to  Peter,  who 
liked  them  very  much  and  would  have  staked  his  life 
upon  their  being  angels.  But  when  it  came  to  driving 
out  to  small  unnoticeable  inns,  Peter  squared  his  shoul- 
ders and  stayed  at  home. 

'  The  devil  take  it !  "  said  Nicholas  one  night,  with 
frightful  frankness  which  was  devoid  of  any  inten- 
tional insolence.  "What's  this  cursed  provincialism 
that  hangs  to  you?  I  suppose  it  comes  from  the  fact 
that  you  were  born  in  a  shack  to  the  tinkle  of  the  trol- 
ley-car!" 

Peter's  howl  of  laughter  made  the  piano  play  an 
immaculate  tune.  "Wrong,"  he  said.  "Gee!  but 
you're  absolutely  wrong.  The  whole  thing  comes  to 
this,  Nick:  One  of  these  fine  days  I'm  going  to  be 
married.  The  girl  I  marry  is  going  to  be  clean.  I 
believe  in  fairness.  I'm  going  to  be  clean.  That's  all 
there  is  to  it." 

So  that,  one  way  and  another,  Dr.  Hunter  G.  Guth- 


YOUTH  15 

rie,  of  New  York,  as  well  as  St.  John's  College,  Ox- 
ford, had  several  reasons  to  be  rather  proud  of  this 
man  Peter. 


Ill 

ONE  o'clock  that  afternoon  found  Peter  still  ham- 
mering on  his  piano,  not  only  to  the  intense  delight  of 
three  snub-nosed  tradesmen's  boys  who  delayed  de- 
livery of  mutton-chops  and  soles,  which  were  only 
plaice,  but  also  of  five  people  who  had  come  quietly 
into  the  room.  They  stood  together  watching  and  lis- 
tening and  waiting  for  him  suddenly  to  discover  that 
he  was  not  alone.  One  was  a  tall,  rather  angular, 
clean-shaven,  noticeably  intellectual  man  whose  thin 
hair  was  grey  and  who  wore  very  large  glasses  with 
tortoise-shell  frames,  through  which  he  looked  with 
pale,  short-sighted  eyes.  He  held  a  grey  hat  in  his 
thin  hand  and  stood  watching  the  boy  —  who  made  his 
piano  do  the  work  of  a  full  band  —  with  a  smile  of 
infinite  pride  on  his  lips.  Another  was  a  little  lady, 
all  soft  and  sweet,  with  a  bird-like  face  and  a  curious 
bird-like  appearance.  All  about  her  there  was  a  sort 
of  perennial  youthfulness,  and  the  goodness  of  her 
kind  heart  gleamed  so  openly  in  her  eyes  that  they 
asked  beggars  and  cripples,  itinerant  musicians,  raga- 
muffins, street  dogs  and  all  humbugs  to  come  and  be 
helped.  At  that  moment  they  were  full  of  tears,  al- 
though little  lines  of  laughter  were  all  about  them. 
Another  was  a  slight,  exceedingly  good-looking  young 
man  whose  hair  went  into  a  series  of  small  waves  and 


16         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

was  brushed  away  from  his  forehead.  He  was  grin- 
ning like  a  Cheshire  cat  and  showing  two  rows  of  teeth 
which  would  make  a  dentist  both  envious  and  annoyed. 
There  was  a  slight  air  of  precocity  about  his  clothes. 
Two  girls  made  up  the  rest  of  the  party.  Both  were 
young  and  slim  and  of  average  height.  Both  were 
unmistakably  American  in  their  fearless  independence 
and  cleanness  of  cut.  One  was  dark,  with  almost 
black  eyebrows  which  just  failed  to  meet  in  the  mid- 
dle. Her  eyes  were  amazing  and  as  full  of  danger  as 
a  maxim, —  large  and  blue  —  the  most  astonishing 
blueness.  They  were  framed  with  long,  thick,  black 
lashes.  Her  lips  were  rather  full  and  red,  and  her 
skin  white.  She  might  have  been  an  Italian  or  a 
Spaniard.  The  other  girl  was  blonde  and  slim, 
with  large  grey  eyes  set  widely  apart,  a  small  patri- 
cian nose  and  a  lovely  little  mouth  turning  up  at  the 
corners. 

How  long  all  these  people  would  have  stayed  watch- 
ing and  listening  no  man  can  say.  Suddenly,  in  the 
middle  of  a  bar,  Peter  sprang  up  and  turned  round. 
His  cry  of  joy  and  the  way  in  which  he  plunged  for- 
ward and  picked  up  the  little  bird-like  woman  in  his 
arms  was  very  good  to  see. 

"  Mother !  "  he  cried.  "  Mother !  Oh,  Gee !  This 
is  great !  "  and  he  kissed  her  cheeks  and  her  hands,  and 
then  her  cheeks  again,  all  the  while  making  strange, 
small,  fond  noises  like  a  little  boy  who  comes  back 
home  after  the  holidays. 

"  Oh,  dear,  dear  Peter ! "  said  the  little  woman,  be- 
tween tears  and  laughter.  "How  splendidly  rough 


YOUTH  17 

you  are !  You  shake  me  to  pieces !  Where  shall  I  be 
able  to  tidy  my  hair?  " 

Then,  with  a  rather  constrained  air  and  a  touch  of 
nervous  cordiality,  Peter  turned  to  his  father  and  took 
his  hand.  "How  are  you,  father?"  he  asked. 
"  You  look  fine." 

Dr.  Hunter  Guthrie  swallowed  something  and  gave 
a  murmur  which  remained  incoherent.  Before  he 
could  pull  himself  together,  Peter  was  hugging  his  sis- 
ter, who  squealed  like  a  pig  from  the  tightness  of  this 
man's  mighty  grasp.  And  then  the  brother  came  in 
for  it  and  winced  with  pain  and  pleasure  as  his  hand 
was  taken  in  a  vise-like  grip. 

"Hello,  Graham!" 

"Hello,  Peter!" 

And  then  everybody  except  Peter  burst  out  laugh- 
ing. He  stood  in  front  of  the  fair  girl,  with  his  mouth 
wide  open,  and  held  out  his  hand  and  said :  "  I  was 
going  to  hunt  the  whole  place  for  you, —  I  beg  your 
pardon."  It  was  when  he  drew  back,  with  his  face 
and  neck  the  color  of  a  beet  root,  that  the  laughter 
reached  its  climax. 

Belle  Guthrie  was  the  first  to  find  her  voice. 
"  Well,  Peter,"  she  said,  "  that's  going  some.  Is  an 
introduction  superfluous  in  Oxford?  Where  did  you 
meet  Betty  Townsend  ?  " 

"  I  haven't  met  her,"  said  Peter.  "  I  saw  her  this 
morning  in  the  High  for  a  second — "  He  ran  his 
finger  round  his  collar  and  moved  from  one  foot  to  the 
other  and  shifted  his  great  shoulders.  No  man  on 
this  earth  had  ever  looked  so  uncomfortable. 


i8         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

And  then,  with  consummate  coolness,  Betty  Town- 
send  came  to  the  rescue.  "  Just  after  we  arrived  this 
morning,"  she  said,  "  and  you  were  all  buying  picture 
post-cards,  I  passed  Mr.  Guthrie  when  I  was  walking 
along  the  High  Street  with  Graham's  friend.  I  recog- 
nized him  from  the  photographs  that  you  have  at 
home,  and  I  think  he  must  have  heard  me  ask,  '  Who's 
that? '  I  naturally  gave  him  a  friendly  look.  That's 
all." 

"  I  didn't  catch  the  friendly  look,"  said  Peter.  But 
he  did  catch  the  friendly  tone  and  stored  it  up  among 
his  treasures.  Then  he  suddenly  stirred  himself,  being 
host,  picked  up  his  mother  and  placed  her  on  his  elab- 
orate sofa ;  gave  his  best  arm-chair  to  his  father;  waved 
his  sister  into  the  window-seat  with  her  friend,  and 
tilted  Graham  into  a  deck  chair. 

Standing  in  the  middle  of  the  room,  beaming  with 
pride,  he  said :  "  How  in  thunder  did  you  get  here 
so  soon?  Your  wire  said  that  you  were  coming  to 
tea,  and  I  was  going  to  meet  the  train  leaving  Pad- 
dington  at  three-thirty.  Gee!  This  is  the  best  thing 
that  ever  happened !  Will  you  lunch  here  ?  " 

"  Oh,  no,  dear !  "  said  Mrs.  Guthrie.  "  So  many  of 
us  will  worry  your  landlady." 

Then  out  came  one  of  Peter's  huge  laughs. 
"  Worry  my  landlady  ?  One  look  at  Mrs.  Brownstack 
would  show  you  that  she  got  over  being  worried  before 
the  great  wind.  Why  she's  kept  lodgings  for  under- 
graduates for  twenty  years.  It's  the  same  thing  as 
saying  that  she's  spent  the  greater  part  of  her  life  sit- 
ting on  the  top  of  Vesuvius.  I  can  give  you  beer,  beef, 


YOUTH  19 

pickles,  biscuits,  cake,  swipes  they  call  coffee,  some 
corking  Nougat  and  three  brands  of  cigarettes." 

"  I  think,"  said  Dr.  Guthrie,  with  a  suggestion  of 
haste,  "  it  might  be  better  if  you  lunched  with  us  at 
the  hotel."  Like  all  doctors,  his  first  thoughts  were 
of  digestion. 

"  Right-o !  "  said  Peter,  and  he  dived  into  his  bed- 
room for  a  more  respectable  coat.  His  brother  fol- 
lowed him  in  and  the  two  stood  facing  each  other  for  a 
moment,  eye  to  eye.  They  had  not  met  for  two  years. 
Instinctively  they  grasped  hands  again  and  the  minds 
of  both  were  filled  with  most  affectionate  things  —  a 
very  flood  of  words  —  but  one  said  "  Old  man !  "  and 
the  other  "  Peter ! "  And  while  Graham  brushed  his 
kinky  hair  with  a  temporary  suggestion  of  throati- 
ness,  Peter  hauled  out  his  best  coat  and  whistled  to 
show  how  utterly  unmoved  he  was. 

They  returned  to  the  sitting-room  together.  Dr. 
Guthrie  was  examining  the  conglomeration  of  books 
that  loaded  the  shelves.  The  plays  of  Bernard  Shaw 
rubbed  shoulders  with  "  Masterton  on  Land  Taxes." 
Stevenson's  "  Treasure  Island "  leaned  up  against 
Webster's  Dictionary.  "  Tono-Bungay "  had  for  a 
companion  a  slushy  novel  by  Garvice  —  and  on  them 
all  was  dust. 

The  little  mother,  all  a-flutter  like  a  thrush,  was  at 
the  window  looking  through  the  trees  at  the  warm  old 
buildings  opposite.  The  two  girls  were  peering  into 
a  cupboard  as  into  the  "  Blue  Room,"  where  they 
found  nothing  but  a  few  whiskey  bottles,  several  packs 
of  cards,  a  box  of  chess-men,  a  couple  of  mortar- 


20         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

boards  with  all  their  corners  gone,  and  a  large  collec- 
tion of  white  shoes  in  all  grades  of  dilapidation. 

"Are  you  all  ready?"  asked  Dr.  Guthrie,  with  a 
curious  gayety.  Among  all  this  youth  even  he  felt 
young. 

"  Rather,"  said  Peter.     "  I  could  eat  an  ox." 

He  opened  the  door,  touched  his  mother's  soft  cheek 
with  his  ringer  as  she  passed,  tweaked  his  sister's  hair, 
refrained  from  catching  Betty  Townsend's  eyes, 
winked  at  his  brother  and  drew  back  for  his  father. 

Once  in  the  quad  Mrs.  Guthrie  whispered  to  Gra- 
ham and  went  quickly  out  into  St.  Giles,  beckoning  to 
the  two  girls  to  follow.  She  was  very  anxious  that 
Peter  should  walk  with  his  father,  and  this  —  rather 
pleased  with  himself  —  Peter  did.  He  would  have 
taken  his  father's  arm  if  he  had  dared,  he  was  so 
mighty  glad  to  see  him.  Several  times  the  Doctor 
seemed  about  to  do  the  same  thing,  but  his  hand  hesi- 
tated and  dropped.  And  so  these  two  fell  in  step  and 
walked  silently  along  towards  the  Randolph  Hotel, 
passed  by  men  in  twos  or  threes,  many  of  whom,  to 
the  Doctor's  inward  delight,  cried  out,  "  Hullo, 
Peter!  "  with  tremendous  cordiality.  It  was  not  until 
they  turned  the  corner  that  the  Doctor  spoke. 

"  It  gives  me  real  pleasure  to  see  you  again,  Peter," 
he  said,  with  a  quick  self-conscious  glance  at  the  young 
giant  at  his  elbow. 

'  Thank  you,  father,"  said  Peter,  looking  straight 
ahead  and  getting  as  red  as  a  peony. 


YOUTH  21 


IV 

NICHOLAS  KENYON  more  than  lived  up  to  his  prom- 
ise. In  clothes  into  which  he  seemed  to  have  been 
poured  in  liquid  form,  he  handed  hot  toast  and  cakes  to 
Peter's  family  at  tea-time  with  that  air  of  deferential 
impertinence  which  was  his  peculiar  property.  He 
had  the  same  effect  on  the  Doctor  and  Mrs.  Guthrie 
and  the  two  girls  as  he  had  on  Peter  when  he  first  saw 
him  on  the  train.  His  complete  self-control,  his  in- 
dolent assurance,  his  greyhound  look  of  thoroughbred- 
ness  and  the  decorative  way  in  which  he  phrased  his 
sentences  all  charmed  and  amused  them.  For  Peter's 
sake  he  came  right  out  of  his  shell  at  once  and  behaved 
like  a  man  who  had  been  a  favorite  in  that  family  cir- 
cle for  years.  In  the  most  subtle  manner  he  implied 
to  the  Doctor  that  his  fame  as  a  bacteriologist  had 
spread  all  over  Oxford,  and  even  England.  He  re- 
fused to  believe  that  Mrs.  Guthrie  was  the  mother  of 
her  children  and  not  her  own  eldest  daughter.  He 
asked  Graham  almost  at  once  to  do  him  the  favor  of 
giving  him  the  name  of  his  tailor,  and  told  Betty  that 
he  had  shot  with  her  father,  Lord  Townsend,  many 
times,  well-knowing  that  he  was  a  portrait  painter  in 
New  York.  With  consummate  ease  and  tact  he  put 
everybody  on  the  best  of  terms  with  one  another  and 
themselves,  thereby  winning  still  more  of  Peter's  ad- 
miration and  liking.  With  great  pleasure  he  accepted 
the  Doctor's  invitation  to  dine  at  the  Randolph  Hotel, 
and  in  return  invited  all  present  to  be  his  guests  at  the 


22          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Open  Air  Performance  of  "  Twelfth  Night,"  later  in 
the  week,  by  the  O.U.D.S.,  in  the  beautiful  gardens 
of  Worcester.  In  a  word,  he  played  with  these  people 
as  a  cat  plays  with  a  mouse  and  as  he  had  always  played 
with  Peter.  He  used  all  his  brain  not  only  to  win  their 
confidence  and  friendship  but  to  make  an  impression 
which  might  afterwards  be  of  use  to  himself. 

Nicholas  Kenyon  was  one  of  those  men  who  are 
born  and  not  made.  He  opened  his  eyes  to  find 
himself  in  an  atmosphere  of  aristocratic  roguery. 
The  beautiful  old  house  in  which  his  father  lived  was 
mortgaged  to  the  very  tops  of  the  chimneys.  It  was 
maintained  on  money  borrowed  from  the  loan  sharks  at 
an  exorbitant  interest.  It  was  filled  with  men  and 
women  who,  like  his  own  parents,  were  clever  and 
intellectual  enough  to  work  for  their  livelihood,  but 
who  preferred  to  live  on  their  wits  and  cling  to  so- 
ciety by  the  skin  of  their  teeth.  In  this  atmosphere  of 
expert  parasites  —  an  atmosphere  as  false  as  it  was 
light-hearted  —  Nicholas  was  brought  up.  He  was  a 
complete  man  of  the  world  at  fourteen.  Even  at  that 
age  he  gambled,  raced  and  borrowed  money;  and  in 
order  to  provide  himself  with  the  necessities  of  life 
he  ran  a  roulette  table  in  secret  at  Eton  and  made  a 
book  for  the  racing  bets  of  the  little  boys  of  his  own 
kidney.  Highly  gifted  and  endowed  with  a  most 
likable  personality,  with  the  art  of  eluding  punishment 
for  misdeeds  brought  to  a  masterly  completeness,  he 
could  have  been  shaped,  under  different  circumstances, 
into  a  man  whose  name  would  stand  high  in  his  coun- 
try. With  the  proper  training  and  discipline  and  the 


YOUTH  23 

right  sense  of  duty  which  is  given  to  those  lucky  lads 
whose  parents  are  responsible  and  honorable  he  had 
it  in  his  power  to  become  a  famous  diplomat.  As  it 
was,  he  entered  Oxford  as  a  parasite  and  would  leave 
the  university  for  the  world  in  the  same  capacity.  He 
was  entirely  unscrupulous.  He  had  no  code  of  honor. 
He  quietly  used  the  men  about  him  to  provide  him  with 
amusement,  money,  hospitality,  and  to  insure  him 
against  having  to  work.  He  turned  his  personality 
into  a  sort  of  business  asset  —  a  kind  of  limited  lia- 
bility company  —  which  brought  him  in  regular  divi- 
dends. His  breeding  and  good  form,  his  well-known 
name  and  his  inherent  ability  to  slide  comfortably  into 
any  set  or  society,  made  him  wholly  irresistible.  No 
one  suspected  him,  because  his  frankness  disarmed  sus- 
picion. His  knowledge  of  human  nature  told  him  that 
the  paradox  of  his  being  poor  lent  him  a  sort  of  ro- 
mance, and  he  always  began  by  telling  new  acquaint- 
ances that  he  was  broke  to  the  wide.  In  this  way  he 
struck  the  honest  note  of  the  men  who  disdain  to  con- 
vey false  impressions.  He  was  poor,  but  proud,  and 
made  himself  so  attractive  and  companionable  that 
men  were  delighted  to  be  put  to  great  expense  in  order 
to  entertain  him, —  and  he  wanted  everything  of  the 
very  best.  His  clothes  were  immaculate.  His  cigar- 
ettes were  freshly  rolled.  When  he  drove  a  car  it  had 
to  be  of  the  best  known  make.  He  was  a  most  fas- 
tidious reader  and  had  once  read  a  paper  on  modern 
poetry  which  had  startled  the  Dons  of  his  college. 
He  contributed  short  satirical  articles  to  the  Isis  from 
time  to  time  which  tickled  the  intellect  of  the  more  dis- 


24          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

criminating;  and  as  a  fresher  had  given  a  performance 
of  Puck  in  one  of  the  productions  of  the  O.U.D.S., 
over  which  undergraduate  critics  went  raving  mad. 
Even  in  his  dealings  with  his  friends,  the  chorus  girls, 
there  was  a  certain  touch  of  humour  which  made  it 
impossible  even  for  the  most  straightlaced  to  say  hard 
things  of  him. 

In  a  word,  Nicholas  Kenyon  was  a  very  dangerous 
man.  His  influence  was.  as  subtly  bad  and  pernicious 
as  a  beautifully  made  cigarette  heavily  charged  with 
dope;  and  he  would  at  any  time  if  necessary  have 
stolen  his  mother's  toilet  set  in  order  to  provide  him- 
self with  caviar,  plover's  eggs  and  a  small  bottle  of 
champagne. 

And  this  was  the  man  who  had  shared  rooms  with 
Peter  Guthrie  during  his  terms  at  Oxford,  and  of 
whom  the  Doctor  spoke  that  first  night  of  his  stay  at 
the  Randolph  Hotel  as  an  unusually  charming  person 
whom  it  was  a  pleasure  to  meet. 

In  fact,  he  was  the  sole  topic  of  conversation  in  all 
the  bedrooms  of  Peter's  family  party  before  the  lights 
were  turned  out.  Mrs.  Guthrie  said,  as  she  sat  in 
front  of  the  dressing-table  combing  her  hair :  "  How 
lucky  it  is,  dear,  that  Peter  has  found  such  a  wonder- 
ful friend  here  I  He  is  so  English  and  so  refined  —  in 
every  sense  of  the  word  a  gentleman."  The  Doctor 
thoroughly  agreed  with  her  and  made  a  mental  note  to 
invite  Kenyon  to  his  house  in  New  York  in  the  autumn. 

Belle  Guthrie  took  her  brushes  into  Betty's  room, 
which  was  next  to  her  own,  and  looking  extremely 
attractive  in  a  pale  pink  kimono,  with  her  dark 


YOUTH  25 

hair  all  about  her  shoulders  and  her  naked  feet  in  pink, 
heel-less  slippers,  gave  a  ripple  of  excited  laughter  and 
confided  to  her  friend  that  she  was  going  to  have  a 
more  bully  time  even  than  she  had  hoped.  "  I  love 
St.  John's  College,"  she  said,  "  and  these  wonderful 
old  streets  and  all  the  church  bells  which  strike  so  fre- 
quently—  but  I'm  perfectly  crazy  about  Nicholas 
Kenyon.  He  is  so, —  so  different  —  so  witty  —  says 
such  perfectly  wonderful  things  —  and  oh,  my  dear! 
did  you  see  the  way  he  looked  at  me  when  he  said 
'good-night'?" 

Betty  shook  her  head  —  her  little  golden  head  — 
her  rather  wise  little  head.  "  I  didn't  look,"  she  said. 
"  The  light  was  shining  on  Peter's  face,  and  that  was 
good  enough  for  me." 

What  Graham  thought  of  Kenyon  came  out  in 
Peter's  rooms,  to  which  he  had  gone  back  with  his 
brother  when  the  family  were  left  at  the  hotel  after 
their  return  from  a  jaunt  on  the  river  in  the  moon- 
light after  dinner, —  the  quiet,  soothing,  narrow 
stream  on  which  they  had  floated  in  punts  all  among 
cushions  and  listened  with  keen  appreciation  to  the 
throbbing  song  of  the  nightingale  and  the  deep  voice 
of  an  undergraduate  singing  "  Annie  Laurie  "  in  the 
back  water  to  the  thrumming  accompaniment  of  a 
mandolin. 

Kenyon  himself  had  gone  round  to  the  rooms  of 
some  friends  of  his  to  play  bridge,  so  the  two  brothers 
were  able  to  talk  undisturbed.  The  night  was  de- 
liciously  warm  and  Peter's  old  windows,  with  their 
numerous  leaded  panes,  were  wide  open.  It  was 


26          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

eleven  o'clock  and  the  life  of  the  town  had  almost 
ceased,  although  from  time  to  time  little  parties  of 
undergraduates  passed  along  St.  Giles  and  their  high- 
spirited  laughter  drifted  up. 

After  having  put  cigarettes  in  front  of  his  brother, 
Peter  flung  himself  full  stretch  upon  his  sofa,  with  a 
pipe  between  his  teeth.  "  Now  for  your  news,  old 
man ! "  he  said.  "  I'm  glad  you  like  Nick.  He  cer- 
tainly is  one  of  the  best.  What  seems  perfectly  amaz- 
ing to  me  is  that  while  I'm  still  a  sort  of  schoolboy, 
rowing  and  reading,  you're  a  full-blown  man  earning 
your  living.  I'd  give  something  to  see  you  buzzing 
about  Wall  Street  with  your  head  full  of  stocks  and 
shares  and  the  rise  and  fall  of  prices.  How  do  you 
doit?" 

Graham  ran  his  hand  rather  nervously  over  his 
mouth.  "It's  great!"  he  said  excitedly.  "That's 
what  I  call  life.  Gee!  You've  no  idea  how  fascinat- 
ing it  is  to  gamble  on  the  tape  and  get  a  thrill  every 
time  you  hear  it  tick.  It's  like  living  among  earth- 
quakes. I  love  it !  " 

"  Gamble ! "  Peter  echoed  the  word  with  a  touch 
of  fright.  "Good  Lord;  but  you  don't  gamble 
surely  ?  I  thought  you  were  a  broker  and  looked  after 
other  people's  concerns !  " 

Graham  shot  out  a  short  laugh.  "Other  people's 
concerns?  Why,  yes;  but  we're  not  in  Wall  Street 
for  other  people.  I've  had  the  luck  of  the  devil  lately 
though, —  everything  I've  touched  has  gone  wrong. 
However,  don't  let's  talk  about  that.  I'm  here  for  a 
holiday  and  a  rest,  and  I  need  'em.  I  believe  I  was 


YOUTH  27 

on  the  verge  of  a  nervous  breakdown  before  I  came 
away.  When  I  get  back  I  shall  have  to  straighten 
things  out.  At  the  present  moment  I'm  out  about 
twenty  thousand  dollars." 

It  was  his  young  brother  who  said  these  things  — 
the  boy  who  two  years  ago  was  only  just  out  of 
Harvard.  Peter  sat  up  —  in  two  senses.  "  You  ? 
Twenty  thousand  dollars !  Have  you  told  father  ?  " 

"  My  God,  no ! "  said  Graham.  "  I  shall  get  it  all 
back  of  course;  otherwise, —  Phut!  As  to  telling 
father, —  well  —  well,  do  you  ever  tell  father  any- 
thing? I'd  rather  face  electrocution  than  go  into  fa- 
ther's room  with  such  a  tale.  Once  before  —  about 
six  months  ago  —  when  I  had  to  meet  a  bill  for  five 
thousand  dollars,  I  had  a  little  talk  with  mother,  and 
after  she  had  a  fit  she  gave  me  a  handful  of  her  jewels 
to  pawn.  She  was  afraid  of  father,  too.  Within 
two  months  I  got  them  out  again.  Steel  did  me  very 
well  that  time ;  and  mother, —  bless  her  dear  heart !  — 
called  me  a  very  clever  boy,  and  said :  '  What  a  brain 
you  have,  darling,  but  please  don't  do  it  again ! '  Oh, 
my  God,  Peter!  You  don't  know  what  Wall  Street 
means.  It's  hell!  It's  marvellous!  It's  life!  One 
of  these  days  when  a  real  good  chance  comes  I'll  go 
some  plunge,  and  then  you'll  see  me  living  quietly  in 
the  country  breeding  ponies  or  dogs  or  chickens  or 
something,  and  I'll  marry  and  settle  down." 

Peter  got  up,  re-loaded  his  pipe,  and  said :  "  Just 
think  of  it!  You're  two  years  younger  than  I  am. 
I've  not  begun  to  live  and  you're  in  the  whirl  of  money 
and  risk.  In  the  meantime  there's  father  so  busy  ex- 


28          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

perimenting  with  microbes  that  he  hasn't  one  idea  of 
what  his  boys  are  doing,  or  are  likely  to  do  —  abso- 
lutely content  to  let  them  find  their  feet  unaided! 
Well,  I  suppose  he  knows  what  he's  doing, —  but  what 
you've  just  told  me  makes  me  wonder  whether  it 
wouldn't  be  wise  for  him  to  experiment  a  little  bit  with 
us  for  a  change.  What  d'you  think?  " 

Graham  shrugged  his  shoulders.  With  the  light  on 
his  face  he  looked  older  than  his  brother,  and  there 
was  something  in  his  eyes  which  showed  that  he  had 
already  gazed  at  life  very  much  more  closely  than  the 
big  healthy  fellow  who  was  his  host.  "  Oh,  well,"  he 
said  —  pouring  himself  out  a  rather  stiff  whiskey  — 
"  we've  never  known  quite  what  it  was  to  have  a  father, 
—  I  mean  except  as  a  sort  of  aloof  institution,  a  vague 
person  who  educated  us  and  placed  us  out.  I  should 
resent  his  butting  in  now.  There's  someone  coming 
up  your  stairs,  isn't  there  ?  " 

There  was.  It  was  Kenyon,  who  rattled  money  in 
his  trousers  pocket  with  a  little  smile  at  the  corners 
of  his  sophisticated  mouth. 


PETER  put  in  the  time  of  his  life  during  the  next 
few  days,  and  like  the  great  big  simple  fellow  that  he 
was,  revelled  in  being  the  little  hero  of  his  family. 

From  morning  until  night  he  kept  them  on  the  move, 
taking  them  to  all  his  favorite  haunts  in  the  town  and 
out  in  the  country,  introducing  to  them  whole  flocks  of 


YOUTH  29 

his  friends,  with  whom  they  had  tea  and  lunch ;  guiding 
them  into  the  strange  quiet  chapels  that  were  filled 
with  the  aroma  of  dead  years  like  a  bowl  of  dry  rose- 
leaves;  going  with  them  into  the  sweet,  quiet,  sacred, 
stately  seclusion  of  New  College  Garden  and  into  the 
echoing  cloisters  of  Magdalen.  They  were  good  days, 
memorable  days,  giving  them  all  mental  pictures  that 
even  time  would  not  blur  nor  age  rub  out.  To  Peter 
the  best  of  all  the  afternoons  was  the  one  when  he 
looked  up  at  the  St.  John's  barge  as  he  paddled  out 
into  the  river  in  the  College  Eight  and  caught  the 
eager  and  excited  eyes  of  all  the  people  who  meant  so 
much  to  him,  and  especially  those  of  Betty.  He  rowed 
that  afternoon  as  he  had  never  rowed  before,  carrying 
with  him  all  along  the  stream  the  raucous  shouts  of  the 
members  of  his  college  who  tore  along  the  tow-path 
almost  demented  with  enthusiasm,  firing  pistols,  turn- 
ing rattles  and  screaming  "  St.  John's !  St.  John's ! 
Give  her  ten !  Give  her  ten !  Up !  Up ! "  And 
finally,  when  he  staggered  out  of  the  boat  almost  sick 
from  exertion,  his  knees  shaking  under  him,  the 
thought  that  came  to  him  as  he  heard  the  incessant 
cries  of  "Good  old  Peter!"  was  "Thank  God  for 
this!  The  Governor  will  get  something  back  for  all 
he  has  done  for  me."  He  just  waved  his  hand  to  his 
people,  felt  his  way  into  the  barge,  laid  himself  flat 
on  the  floor  and  underwent  the  soothing  process  of  be- 
ing rubbed  and  sponged  down  —  and  all  the  while  he 
smiled  and  was  very  happy. 

He  didn't  catch  the  look  of  maternal  agony  in  his 
mother's  eyes  nor  her  remarks  —  which  was  perhaps 


30         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

just  as  well.  Seeing  her  great  big  boy  crumpled  up 
over  his  oar  before  he  was  assisted  out  of  the  boat, 
seeing  him  stand  rocking  like  a  drunken  man  with  his 
great  chest  heaving  and  his  face  the  color  of  a  green 
apple,  she  leaned  over  the  rail  and  cried  out :  "  Oh, 
my  dear,  what  have  they  done  to  you?  Oh,  Hunter, 
you  must  not  let  him  do  these  things,  he'll  kill  him- 
self! Oh,  Peter,  Peter!" 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  no  one  heard  her.  There  was 
too  much  good  solid  roar  going  on.  Every  lusty- 
throated  St.  John's  man  was  shouting  at  the  full  capac- 
ity of  his  lungs.  Oh,  but  it  was  a  good  scene!  And 
for  the  quiet,  studious  Doctor  who  had  sat  day  after 
day  for  the  greater  part  of  his  life  watching  bacteri- 
ological experiments,  with  the  most  intense  interest, 
it  was  one  that  caused  his  blood  to  move  almost  dan- 
gerously through  his  veins  and  make  him  shout  for 
the  first  time  in  his  life. 

It  had  a  different  effect  upon  temperamental  Belle, 
who  danced  with  excitement  and  kept  on  saying,  in  a 
sort  of  refrain,  "  Oh,  I'm  crazy  about  all  this  —  simply 
crazy !  "  As  for  Graham,  even  the  thrill  of  Wall  Street 
seemed  poor  to  him  in  comparison  with  this  stirring 
scene, —  the  wild  rush  of  men,  the  rhythmetic  plunge 
of  oars,  the  glorious  muscular  effort  and  the  frenzied 
outburst. 

Betty  merely  smiled,  clasped  her  hands  together  and 
held  her  breath.  It  seemed  to  her  that  in  Peter  all  the 
heroes  of  her  youth, —  Brian  de  Bois  Guilbert,  Ivan- 
hoe  and  the  rest, —  were  epitomized  in  the  form,  the 
splendid  young  giant  form  of  her  fellow-countryman. 


YOUTH  31 

Above  all  things  in  the  world  she  wanted  to  lean  over 
and  put  a  wreath  of  laurels  on  the  man  who  stroked 
the  St.  John's  boat  to  victory.  As  it  was,  she  cried  a 
little,  quietly  and  simply,  not  caring  who  saw  her  tears ; 
and  in  her  heart,  for  a  reason  which  she  herself  found 
unexplainable,  she  sang  "  My  Country  'tis  of  Thee." 
She  had  never  in  her  life  been  so  deeply  stirred,  and 
who  can  wonder  at  that?  There  is  indeed  something 
full  of  inspiration  about  these  undergraduates'  strug- 
gles on  the  water  and  the  fervent  partisanship  of  the 
colleges.  It  is  unique  and  splendid  and  sends  young 
men  out  into  the  world  with  good  and  beautiful  mem- 
ories and  with  the  love  and  loyalty  for  their  alma 
mater  which  makes  them  better  able  to  serve  the  women 
who  need  them  and  the  country  to  which  they  be- 
long. 

And  when,  having  changed  his  shorts  and  got  once 
more  into  his  flannels,  Peter  went  up  to  the  roof  of  the 
barge,  stinging  with  health  and  glowing  with  very 
natural  pride  and  satisfaction,  it  was  the  Doctor 
whose  hand  he  first  took,  and  the  Doctor  who  said: 
"My  son,  my  dear  son!"  It  was  an  extraordinary 
moment  for  Peter,  who  had  never  in  his  life  before 
felt  the  indescribable  barrier  which  existed  between 
his  father  and  himself  so  near  to  crumbling. 

That  night,  while  his  father  and  mother  and  Graham 
were  taken  to  the  theatre  by  three  of  his  fellow  Rhodes 
scholars,  to  see  a  performance  of  one  of  Gilbert  and 
Sullivan's  plays,  Peter  and  Nicholas  Kenyon  took 
Betty  and  Belle  to  the  Worcester  Ball,  the  two  girls 
being  under  the  wing  of  the  wife  of  one  of  the  Dons. 


32 

It  was  one  of  those  warm,  clear,  silver  nights  which 
the  fickle  climate  of  England  sometimes  produces  ap- 
parently to  show  what  it  can  do  when  it  likes.  The 
moon  was  full  and  the  sky  was  bespattered  with  stars. 
The  trees  on  the  smooth  lawn  round  the  old  college 
flung  their  shadows  as  though  in  sunlight  and  it  was 
to  a  seat  under  one  of  these  that  Peter  led  Betty  just 
before  midnight,  having  very  nearly  danced  her  off  her 
feet.  They  sat  down  panting  a  little,  and  laughing  for 
no  reason,  and  listened  for  a  moment  to  the  strains  of 
the  band  which  drifted  through  the  open  windows  of 
the  hall. 

It  was  not  in  Peter  to  do  anything  by  halves.  He 
worked  and  played  like  a  Trojan  and  put  his  back  into 
everything  that  he  took  up.  He  knew  by  this  time, 
short  as  it  was,  that  he  was  wholly  and  completely  in 
love  with  the  little  girl,  the  first  sight  of  whom  had 
made  him  catch  his  breath.  With  a  peculiar  kind  of 
grimness  he  had  made  up  his  mind  that  she  was  for  him 
if  he  could  win  her,  and  all  the  previous  night  he 
had  dreamed  of  her  as  his  future  wife,  as  the  girl  who 
would  stand  by  his  side,  helpmate  and  everlasting 
lover,  and  for  whom  he  would  work  well  and  live 
well  and  carry  her  with  him  rung  by  rung  to  the  top 
of  the  ladder.  He  told  himself  when  he  awoke  that 
he  was  a  presumptuous  ass  even  to  dream  that  she 
would  care  for  him.  What  was  there  in  him  for  such 
a  girl  to  care  about?  All  the  same,  he  set  his  teeth 
and  from  that  moment  laid  all  his  future  plans  and  his 
hopes  and  ambitions  and  all  the  best  of  his  nature,  at 
her  little  feet  —  and  knew  perfectly  well  that  if  Betty 


YOUTH  33 

could  not  love  him  eventually  he  would  walk  alone 
through  life. 

Odd,  romantic  or  foolish  as  it  may  seem,  when 
youth  falls  in  and  out  of  love  so  easily,  this  was  true. 
Peter  had,  with  a  sort  of  unrealized  solemnity,  kept 
his  heart  free  and  pure.  He  was  no  trifler  —  he  had 
never  philandered.  Like  the  boy  who,  perhaps  un- 
duly imaginative,  believes  that  he  will  find  the  place 
where  the  rainbow  ends,  Peter  said  to  himself :  "  One 
day  I  shall  find  my  girl.  I  want  to  go  to  her  heart- 
whole  and  complete." 

There  was  nothing  of  sentimentality  about  this.  It 
was  simply  the  outcome  of  the  effect  of  the  mother- 
influence  upon  the  boy  which  had  become  a  very  con- 
crete thing.  Somehow,  ever  since  he  was  old  enough 
to  remember  and  to  think,  he  had  looked  upon  his 
mother  as  his  sweetheart,  and  when  she  bent  over  his 
cot  at  night  and  asked  God  to  bless  him  and  left  the 
touch  of  her  soft  lips  upon  his  forehead  she  had  im- 
pressed upon  him  the  unconscious  ambition  to  make 
another  such  woman  the  centre  of  his  own  home. 
The  numerous  tender  services,  the  exquisite  maternal 
thought  fulness  of  this  little  mother-woman,  had  been 
built  up  by  him  into  a  protection  and  a  load-star. 
Betty  came  —  a  girl  in  whom  he  recognized  at  once 
another  mother  —  and  she  just  touched  his  heart  with 
her  finger  and  walked  straight  in,  fitting  into  the  place 
which  had  been  kept  for  her  like  a  diamond  into  its 
setting. 

Poor  dear  old  Peter!  No  one  would  have  thought, 
who  looked  at  him  sitting  there  in  his  big  awkwardness 


34         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

and  incoherence,  that  he  was  a  man  in  love,  although 
a  psychologist  or  even  an  ordinarily  observant  girl 
could  very  easily  have  told  how  Betty  felt. 

"Topping,  isn't  it?"  he  said. 

"  Simply  wonderful,"  she  replied. 

"Tired?" 

"  Not  a  bit." 

"  Pretty  good  floor,  eh  ?  " 

"  Perfectly  splendid." 

"  Gee !     I  shall  miss  this  place." 

"  Why,  of  course  you  will." 

"All  the  same,  I  shall  be  mighty  keen  to  get  at 
things, —  and  begin." 

"  Yes,  of  course  you  will." 

"  How  do  you  know  ?  " 

"  Oh,  that's  easy." 

"Is  it?    How?" 

"Well,  don't  I  know  you?" 

"Do  you?     I  wish  you  did." 

Up  in  the  branches  something  stirred.  It  may  have 
been  Cupid  —  probably  it  was. 

But  silence  followed  this  conversational  effort  —  a 
silence  broken  by  a  great  heaving  sigh,  mostly  of  ex- 
citement, and  the  strains  of  the  band  which  drifted  out 
of  the  windows  of  the  College  Hall. 

And  over  them  both,  as  over  all  other  men  and 
women,  young  and  old,  at  the  beginning  and  at  the 
end,  hung  the  moon  and  the  stars. 

How  good  it  is  to  be  young  and  in  love ! 


YOUTH  35 


VI 

/ 

UNNOTICED  by  Mrs.  Guthrie  and  her  two  boys, 
there  was  something  more  than  a  little  pathetic  in  the 
Doctor's  eager,  wistful  attitude  toward  the  rather 
thoughtless,  high-spirited,  seething  youth  in  the  mid- 
dle of  which  he  found  himself  for  the  first  time. 

This  man  had  never  been  young.  The  atmosphere 
of  the  farm  on  which  he  had  been  born  killed  youth 
as  foul  air  kills  a  caged  bird.  Poverty,  sordidness  and 
the  grim,  constant  struggle  to  live  made  his  childhood 
and  early  days  utterly  devoid  of  the  good  sweet  things. 
His  mother,  worn  out  and  dispirited,  died  in  giving 
him  birth,  and  his  father,  bitter,  lonely  and  filled  with 
the  irony  that  comes  from  a  long  and  unprofitable 
hand-to-hand  fight  with  mother-earth,  let  him  bring 
himself  up.  He  was  turned  out  to  work  at  a  time 
when  most  lads  are  sent  to  school.  He  had  to  trudge 
daily  into  the  straggling,  one-eyed  town,  at  an  early 
hour,  to  report  at  the  chemist's  store  where  he  obtained 
employment  as  an  errand  boy.  Most  of  the  small 
wages  he  earned  were  required  by  his  father.  From 
almost  the  very  beginning  life  was  to  him  a  sort  of 
whirling  stream  into  which  he  had  been  flung  before 
having  been  taught  to  swim.  Mere  self-preservation 
demanded  that  he  should  keep  himself  afloat.  He 
picked  up  education  as  a  stray  dog  picks  up  an  occa- 
sional bone.  There  was,  however,  great  grit  in  this 
boy  and  deep  down  in  his  soul  an  ambition  to  become 
something  better  than  his  father,  whose  daily  wrestle 


36          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

with  nature  —  the  most  relentless  of  task-mistresses 
—  had  warped  his  character  and  stultified  his  soul. 
Young  Hunter  shuddered  at  the  thought  of  living  al- 
ways on  the  farm,  of  grubbing  in  the  earth,  of  planting 
and  hoeing  and  reaping,  of  facing  the  almost  inevi- 
table tragedy  of  spoiled  crops  and  ruined  hopes,  and 
the  yearly  set-backs  of  advancing  freights  and  higher 
wages.  He  looked  with  growing  horror  and  detesta- 
tion at  the  farm  implements  among  which  his  father 
spent  his  life;  and  while  he  ran  his  errands,  carrying 
medicines  and  soda  syphons,  he  nursed  a  dream  in  his 
little  cold  heart,  which  grew  out  of  the  smell  of  medi- 
cines and  the  talk  of  illness  that  was  all  about  him  in 
the  chemist  store.  It  was  to  become  a  doctor  and  tend 
the  needs  of  humanity  and,  if  it  was  in  his  power,  to 
save  to  other  children  the  mothers  who  brought  them 
into  being. 

No  wonder  Dr.  Hunter  Guthrie  wore  strong  glasses 
over  his  short-sighted  eyes.  At  all  times,  with  a  sort 
of  greed  and  an  almost  terrible  eagerness,  he  read 
every  medical  book  on  which  he  could  lay  his  hands, — 
in  bed  by  the  light  of  one  candle,  in  the  cubby-hole  at 
the  back  of  the  store  under  the  glare  of  the  unshaded 
electric  bulb,  in  trolley-cars  and  trains,  and  on  the 
stoop  of  the  shabby  farmhouse  so  long  as  the  light 
lasted.  Later,  after  his  day's  work,  he  attended  night 
classes,  and  even  as  he  walked  from  the  farm  to  the 
town  he  read.  Spending  sleepless  nights  and  living 
laborious  days  he  followed  the  example  of  many  other 
brave  and  determined  boys  whose  names  gleam  like 
beacons  in  the  history  of  their  country.  He  worked 


YOUTH  37 

his  way  through  the  necessary  stages  until  finally,  af- 
ter a  struggle  so  relentless  that  it  nearly  broke  his 
health,  he  became  a  qualified  doctor.  In  order  to  earn 
the  money  for  his  courses  he  was  at  different  times 
bell-boy  in  a  country  hotel,  an  advertisement  writer  in 
a  manufacturer's  office,  a  clerk  for  a  real-estate  man 
and  a  traveling  salesman  for  safety  razors.  His  vaca- 
tions were  more  arduous  than  his  terms,  and  during 
these  he  earned  the  money  with  which  to  pay  his  col- 
lege expenses.  Every  step  up  the  ladder  of  innumer- 
able rungs  —  which  sometimes  seemed  to  him  impos- 
sible to  climb  —  was  painful  and  difficult.  So  much 
concentration  was  needed  from  the  very  beginning  — 
so  much  condensed  determination  and  energy  required 
—  that  at  the  age  of  twenty-five  he  seemed  to  have 
lived  twice  that  number  of  years.  No  wonder  then 
that  the  all-conquering  youth  fulness  of  all  the  under- 
graduates amongst  whom  he  found  himself  at  Oxford 
awoke  a  sort  of  envy  in  his  heart  and  startled  him  who 
had  never  been  young.  There  was  no  meanness, 
jealousy  or  sense  of  martyrism  in  his  feelings  as  he 
watched  the  kaleidoscopic  picture  of  university  life  — 
only  a  sort  of  wonder  and  amazement  that  there  were 
men  in  the  world  so  lucky  —  so  indescribably  fortunate 
as  to  be  able  to  carry  boyhood  and  all  its  joys  forward 
to  an  age  when  he  had  forgotten  that  such  a  period 
existed.  Many  times  during  those  interesting  and 
stirring  days  he  stopped  suddenly  and  thanked  his  God 
that  he  had  been  able  to  do  for  his  own  boys  those 
things  which  no  one  had  ever  done  for  him,  and  give 
them  such  a  chance  in  life  as  he  had  never  had.  Ac- 


38          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

tually  to  see  Peter,  his  eldest  boy,  proving  his  muscular 
strength  and  his  mental  ability  and  moving  among  his 
fellows  with  such  splendid  popularity,  filled  him  with 
pride  and  gladness.  Here  indeed  was  a  very  concrete 
evidence  of  his  reward  for  that  long,  arduous  struggle. 

Like  most  men  who  have  concentrated  upon  one 
thing,  Dr.  Guthrie  was  a  child  when  it  came  to  others. 
Athleticism,  of  which  he  knew  nothing,  filled  him 
with  admiration.  The  knack  of  conversation  amazed 
him.  Even  to  his  wife  he  found  it  difficult  to  talk. 
To  force  himself  to  confide  was  almost  impossible  — 
it  was  like  blasting  a  rock.  One  afternoon  however 
he  got  nearer  to  an  intimate  expression  of  his  feelings 
than  ever  before  —  perhaps  because  he  was  still  under 
the  influence  of  the  intoxication  of  the  youthfulness 
all  about  him. 

Kenyon  had  driven  them  out  after  tea  to  Shotover 
Hill.  All  the  young  people  had  gone  on  to  Cuddes- 
den,  leaving  the  doctor  and  his  wife  to  sit  and  look 
down  into  the  valley  far  below  in  which  nestled  the 
town  and  all  its  colleges  and  spires.  It  had  been  a 
golden  day  and  the  sun  was  setting  with  all  the  dig- 
nity and  pomp  of  early  summer,  making  the  thin  line 
of  the  Thames  shine  like  a  winding  silver  ribbon. 
There  was  something  of  exultation  over  the  earth  that 
evening  and  of  untranslatable  beauty,  and  the  evening 
song  of  the  birds  was  like  that  of  choristers  in  a  great 
cathedral. 

Unusual  words  seethed  in  the  doctor's  head.  He 
was  moved  and  thrilled.  The  rest  and  the  relief  of 
leaving  his  work,  all  the  bustle  and  stir  of  the  new  life 


YOUTH  39 

in  which  he  was  a  temporary  figure,  seemed  to  take 
him  back  to  his  own  early  days  when,  with  the  little 
woman  who  sat  by  his  side,  he  had  stood  with  her  in 
their  first  house,  newly  married. 

He  took  his  hat  off,  put  his  arm  round  the  shoulders 
of  that  faithful  woman  and  kissed  her  cheek  with  a 
touch  of  passion  and  gratitude.  "  My  darling,"  he 
said,  "  I  wish  I  could  say  properly  some  of  the  things 
that  I  feel  about  you  and  my  children  and  the  goodness 
of  God.  There  are  tears  in  my  heart,  and  strange 
feelings.  I  feel  oddly  young  and  strong.  I  want  to 
laugh  and  cry.  I'd  like  to  pick  wild  flowers  and 
make  a  little  crown  for  your  head.  Don't  laugh  at 
me  —  please  don't  laugh." 

The  little  woman  took  his  thin  hand  and  pressed 
it  to  her  cheek.  "  I  laugh  because  that  is  how  I  feel, 
too,"  she  said, — "young  and  glad  and  very  happy  to 
see  my  big  Peter  doing  such  wonderful  things,  and 
still  a  boy.  Dear  old  man,  we  have  much  to  be  thank- 
ful for!  I  know  how  you've  worked  and  striven, — 
and  how  fine  it  is  to  see  some  of  the  results  of  it.  I 
was  a  little  afraid  before  we  came  here  that  we  might 
find  Peter  different  —  altered  —  perhaps  older  —  but 
he's  just  the  same.  He's  exactly  like  you." 

The  Doctor  shook  his  head  and  a  sudden  pain 
twisted  his  thin,  studious  face.  "  Oh  no,  no,"  he  said, 
"  I  was  never  like  that.  I  wish  to  God  I  had  been. 
But  it  was  to  make  Peter  what  he  is  that  I've  worked 
night  and  day.  He's  my  idea  of  a  man.  He's  doing 
all  the  things  that  I'd  like  to  have  done.  He's  me  as 
I  might  have  been  if  I'd  had  any  luck  —  any  sort  of 


40          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

a  chance.  Do  I  regret  it?  Am  I  jealous?  No;  be- 
cause if  I  hadn't  lived  such  an  opposite  life  I  mightn't 
have  desired  to  give  my  boy  all  this."  He  waved  his 
hand  towards  the  spires  that  rose  in  all  their  signif- 
icance out  of  the  town  away  below.  And  then,  with 
intense  eagerness  and  a  ring  of  wistfulness  in  his  voice 
that  brought  tears  to  his  wife's  eyes,  he  bent  towards 
her.  "  Do  you  think  he  realizes  this,  Mary  ?  Does 
Graham  ever  stop  to  think  how  hard  I've  worked  to 
put  him  in  Wall  Street?  Does  Belle  ever  wonder 
what  it's  cost  me  in  youth  and  health  to  give  her  so 
much  more  than  she  needs?  I'm  —  I'm  a  queer, 
wordless,  foolishly  shy  man.  Old  since  the  time  they 
all  three  began  to  think  and  use  their  eyes, —  neces- 
sarily concentrated  and  aloof  away  in  that  laboratory 
of  mine,  and  —  and  sometimes  I  wonder  whether  my 
children  know  me  and  understand  and  make  allow- 
ances. Do  they,  Mary,  my  dear  one?  Do  they?  " 

"  Yes,  my  man,  my  brave  and  splendid  man,"  she 
replied,  "  they  do,  they  do !  "  And  in  saying  this  she 
deliberately  lied, —  out  of  her  great  and  steadfast  love 
for  this  man  of  hers  she  lied. 

No  one  knew  so  well  as  she  did  that  the  father  of 
her  children  might  almost  as  well  be  a  mere  distant 
relation  who  lived  in  their  home  for  reasons  of  con- 
venience and  allotted  money  to  their  requirements  at 
the  proper  time.  No  one  knew  so  well  as  she  did  that 
Hunter  Guthrie's  tragic  lack  of  childhood  had  dried 
out  of  his  nature  the  power  of  understanding  children. 
Never  having  been  a  child  in  any  sense  of  the  word  — 
never  having  known  the  inexpressible  joy  of  a  moth- 


YOUTH  41 

er's  love  —  remembering  nothing  but  a  father  who 
was  either  working  hard  or  tired  out  —  he  was  unable 
to  conceive  what  his  own  children  needed  in  addition 
to  all  that  they  got  hourly  from  his  wife  and  from  his 
own  work.  It  had  always  seemed  to  him  that  in  the 
possession  of  a  mother  they  had  everything  good  that 
God  could  give  them.  It  seemed  to  him  that  his  own 
part  was  performed  by  providing  for  their  needs.  No 
man  desired  to  be  the  father  of  sons  and  daughters 
more  than  he  did.  No  man  was  prouder  in  the  pos- 
session of  them  than  he  was  and  had  always  been. 
To  hear  the  patter  of  their  little  feet  about  his  house 
sent  him  to  his  work  with  that  sense  of  religion  of 
which  Carlyle  wrote.  To  watch  them  shaping  from 
childhood  into  youth  was  the  most  satisfactory  and 
beautiful  thing  in  his  life.  To  be  able,  year  after 
year,  to  do  better  and  still  better  for  them  was  his 
best  and  biggest  reward  —  far  greater  and  more  glor- 
ious than  the  distinction  he  earned  for  himself  and 
the  international  reputation  that  increased  with  each 
of  his  discoveries.  And  when,  six  months  after  Peter 
had  left  home  to  go  to  Oxford  with  a  Rhodes  scholar- 
ship, he  found  himself  unexpectedly  endowed  to  the 
extent  of  over  three  million  dollars  under  the  will  of 
a  late  wealthy  patient,  so  that  he  might,  in  the  old 
man's  own  words,  "  devote  himself,  without  the  fret 
and  fever  of  earning  a  livelihood  as  a  practitioner,  to 
the  noble  and  limitless  work  of  a  bacteriologist  for 
the  benefit  of  suffering  humanity  all  over  the  world," 
it  was  for  the  sake  of  his  children  that  he  offered  up 
thanks.  With  what  immense  pride  he  notified  the 


42         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

authorities  at  Harvard  that  his  son  was  independent 
of  the  scholarship,  which  was  free  to  send  another 
man  to  Oxford.  With  what  keen  pleasure  he  was 
able  to  buy  Graham  a  seat  on  the  Stock  Exchange, 
bring  Belle  out  as  a  debutante  and  send  his  little  Ethel 
to  the  best  possible  school.  These  things  he  could  do, 
and  did,  but  he  could  not  and  had  never  been  able  to 
do  for  them  a  better  thing  than  all  these, —  win  their 
confidence,  their  deep  affection  and  their  friendship. 
That  gift  had  been  killed  in  him.  It  could  not  be 
acquired,  taught  or  purchased,  and  he  had  always  been 
as  much  out  of  touch  with  his  boys  and  girls  as  though 
he  were  divided  from  them  by  a  great  stone  wall.  It 
had  always  been  with  them,  "Look  out!  Here's 
father!"  instead  of  "Hello!  Here's  Dad!"  His 
entrance  into  their  playroom  was  the  signal  for  silence. 
The  sight  of  his  studious  face  and  short-sighted  eyes 
and  distrait,  shy  manner  chilled  them  and  reduced  them 
to  quietude  and  self -consciousness  and  suspicion.  If 
he  had  treated  them  always  as  human  beings,  played 
with  them,  sat  on  the  floor  and  built  houses  with  their 
bricks,  thrown  open  the  door  of  his  study  to  them,  if 
only  for  half  an  hour  every  day,  so  that  there  might 
be  no  possibility  of  its  becoming  a  Blue  Room;  if  he 
had,  as  they  grew  into  the  habit  of  thinking  and  ob- 
serving and  remembering,  told  them  about  himself 
and  his  own  boyhood  and  in  this  way  inculcated  a 
mutual  interest,  a  desire  to  respond  and  open  out;  if, 
before  the  two  boys  had  gone  to  college  he  had  had 
the  courage  to  act  on  the  earnest  advice  of  a  friend 
and  speak  to  them  on  the  vital  question  of  sex,  give 


YOUTH  43 

them  the  truth  as  he  so  well  knew  it  and  warn  them 
bravely  and  rightly  of  the  inevitable  pitfalls  that  lined 
their  youthful  path,  no  brick  wall  would  have  existed 
and  he  would  have  been  their  pal  as  well  as  their 
father, —  a  combination  altogether  irresistible. 

As  it  was  Hunter  Guthrie's  wife,  who  loved  him 
deeply  and  devotedly  and  recognized  in  him  a  great 
man  as  well  as  a  most  unselfish  father,  was  obliged  to 
lie  in  reply  to  his  questions.  She  would  rather  have 
died,  then  and  there,  than  hurt  him  and  bring  down 
his  house  about  his  ears.  The  sad  and  tragic  part  of 
it  all  was  that  she  knew  utterly  that  no  good,  no 
change  could  be  brought  about  by  telling  the  truth. 
It  was  too  late. 

VII 

BELLE  had  told  Betty  that  she  was  "  crazy  "  about 
Nicholas  Kenyon.  There  is  usually  a  wildness  of  ex- 
aggeration about  this  expression  which  renders  it  al- 
most harmless.  The  exuberant  type  of  girl  who  uses 
it  applies  it  with  equal  thoughtlessness  to  a  new  hat,  a 
new  play  or  a  new  set  of  furs.  She  will  be  crazy 
about  a  tenor  and  a  pomeranian,  a  so-called  joke  in  a 
comic  paper  and  the  sermon  of  a  fashionable  preacher. 
In  regard  to  Kenyon,  however,  Belle  was  really  and 
truly  crazy  in  its  most  accurate  dictionary  sense.  Af- 
ter the  Worcester  Ball,  during  which  she  gave  him 
nearly  every  dance, —  to  the  flustered  concern  of  the 
Don's  wife  who  was  her  chaperon, —  she  went  to  no 
trouble  to  conceal  from  Kenyon  the  fact  that  she  found 


44         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

him  vastly  attractive.  Kenyon  was  not  surprised. 
Already  he  was  a  complete  expert  in  the  art  of  making 
himself  loved  by  women.  He  knew  exactly  what  they 
liked  him  to  say  and  he  said  it  with  a  touch  of  inso- 
lence which  took  their  breath  away  and  a  following 
touch  of  deference  which  gave  them  back  their  self- 
respect.  Belle  was  very  much  to  his  liking.  Her 
rather  Latin  beauty,  which  was  rendered  unexplainable 
by  the  sight  of  her  parents  —  her  incessant  high  spirits 
and  love  of  life  —  her  naive  assumption  that  she  was 
the  mistress  of  all  the  secrets  of  this  world,  amused, 
interested  and  tickled  his  fancy.  Her  beauty,  fresh- 
ness and  youth  pleased  him  as  an  epicure,  and  he  went 
out  of  his  way  to  be  with  her  as  much  as  he  could.  He 
had  no  intention  whatever  of  falling  in  love  with  her, 
—  first  of  all  because  it  was  all  against  his  creed  to 
fall  in  love  with  anyone  but  himself;  secondly,  because 
his  way  of  living  demanded  that  he  should  have  no 
partner  in  his  business, —  all  that  he  could  win  by  his 
wits  he  would  need.  Nevertheless,  he  was  quite  as 
ready  as  usual  to  take  everything  that  was  given  to 
him,  and  give  nothing  in  return  except  flattery,  well- 
rounded  sentences  and  a  good  deal  of  his  personal  at- 
tention. 

During  the  week  that  passed  so  quickly  he  had  only 
been  able  to  see  Belle  with  her  people,  and  when  he 
found  that  this  bored  her  as  much  as  it  bored  him,  he 
set  his  brain  to  work  to  devise  some  plan  by  which  he 
could  escape  with  her  from  the  party  for  a  few  hours. 
Needless  to  say  he  succeeded. 

On  the  night  before  the  party  were  to  leave  Oxford 


YOUTH  45 

he  arranged  another  evening  trip  on  the  river,  maneu- 
vred  Peter  into  one  punt  with  his  father  and  mother, 
Graham  and  Betty,  and  got  into  another  with  Belle. 
For  some  little  time  he  poled  along  closely  behind 
them,  but  as  the  river  was  full  of  similar  parties  he 
found  it  easy  to  drop  behind  and  dodge  deftly  into  a 
back  water.  Here  he  tied  up  to  a  branch,  set  himself 
down  on  the  cushions  at  Belle's  side  and  lit  a  cigarette. 

"How's  that?"  he  asked. 

Belle  laughed  a  little  excitedly.  "  Very  clever," 
she  said.  "  I  wondered  how  you  were  going  to  do 
it." 

He  didn't  find  it  necessary  to  tell  her  that  he  had 
performed  a  similar  trick  a  hundred  times.  "  Under 
the  right  sort  of  inspiration,"  he  said,  "  even  I  can 
develop  genius.  Tell  me  something  about  New  York, 
and  what  you  find  to  do  there." 

"  I  should  have  to  talk  from  now  until  to-morrow 
morning  even  to  begin  to  tell  you,"  she  said.  "  I  only 
came  out  last  winter,  but  the  history  of  it  would  fill 
a  book.  New  York  is  some  town  and  I  guess  a  girl 
has  a  better  time  there  than  anywhere  else  in  the 
world.  Why  don't  you  come  and  see  something  of  it 
for  yourself?  " 

Kenyon  leaned  lightly  against  the  girl's  soft 
shoulder.  "  That's  precisely  what  I'm  going  to  do," 
he  said.  "  Your  father  has  given  me  a  cordial  invita- 
tion to  stay  at  his  house,  and  I  shall  go  over  with 
Peter  in  October." 

"Oh,  isn't  that  fine!"  cried  Belle.  "You'll  love 
the  place  —  it's  so  different." 


46         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  I'm  not  worrying  about  the  place,"  said  Kenyon. 
"  I'm  simply  going  for  the  chance  of  dancing  with 
you  to  the  band  which  really  does  know  how  to  play 
rag-time.  It'll  be  worth  crossing  three  thousand  miles 
of  unnecessary  water  to  achieve  that  alone." 

"  I  don't  believe  you,"  said  Belle ;  but  all  her  teeth 
gleamed  in  the  moonlight  and  her  heart  pumped  a 
little.  How  wonderful  it  would  be  to  become  the  wife 
of  the  Honourable  Nicholas  Kenyon,  who  seemed  to 
her  to  be  everything  that  was  desirable. 

Kenyon  picked  up  her  hand  and  just  touched  it 
with  his  lips.  "You  don't  believe  it?  Well,  we'll 
see."  He  knew  very  well  that  if  he  had  chosen  to  do 
so  he  could  have  kissed  her  lips,  but  his  policy  was  to 
go  slow.  His  epicurianism  was  so  complete  that  he 
liked  to  take  his  enjoyment  in  sips  and  not  empty  his 
glass  at  a  gulp.  This  girl  whose  imagined  worldliness 
was  so  childlike  was  well  worth  all  his  attention.  He 
looked  forward  with  absolute  certainty  to  the  hour 
when  he  should  place  her  on  his  little  list  of  achieve- 
ments ;  but  like  all  collectors  and  connoisseurs  he  added 
to  his  pleasure  by  winning  his  point  gradually,  step 
by  step,  with  a  sort  of  cold-blooded  pas"sion. 

Belle  was  accustomed  to  men  who  were  a  little  crude 
in  their  naturalness  and  who  immediately  voiced  their 
admiration  and  their  liking  with  boyish  spontaneity. 
She  had  strings  of  beaux  of  all  ages  who  immediately 
sent  her  flowers  and  presents  and  dogged  her  heels 
from  dance  to  dance  and  rang  her  up  constantly  on  the 
telephone  and  generally  showed  their  eagerness  with 
that  lack  of  control  which  was  characteristic  of  a  na- 


YOUTH  47 

tion  which  had  deliberately  placed  women  in  the  posi- 
tion of  queens. 

Perhaps  it  was  because  this  man's  methods  were  so 
different  that  she  found  him  so  attractive.  He  fed 
her  vanity  and  piqued  it  at  the  same  time.  He  said 
more  by  saying  nothing  than  any  man  had  ever  ven- 
tured to  do,  and  he  retired  so  quickly  after  an  amaz- 
ing advance  that  he  left  her  assuming  more  than  if  he 
had  never  advanced  at  all.  It  was  perfectly  natural, 
although  she  had  already  dipped  into  the  fastest  New 
York  set,  that  she  should  believe  that  at  the  end  of 
every  man's  intention  there  was  a  marriage  and  a 
sort  of  throne  in  his  house.  She  little  knew  Nicholas 
Kenyon.  She  had  had  the  good  fortune  to  meet  men 
in  New  York,  and  not  collectors. 

"  What  are  your  father's  plans  when  he  leaves  Ox- 
ford?" asked  Kenyon,  leaning  a  little  more  closely 
against  the  girl's  soft  shoulder. 

"  Why,  we're  going  to  Shakespeare's  country,  to  the 
English  lakes  and  then  to  Scotland,  where  father's 
ancestors  lived;  and  then  in  August  we  shall  go  to 
London  for  a  week,  and  go  home  on  the  Olympic. 
Why  don't  you  go  over  with  us  ?  " 

"  I  should  like  nothing  better,"  said  Kenyon,  "  but 
as  a  matter  of  fact  I  shall  wait  until  Peter  has  got 
through  his  various  engagements.  He  rows  at  Hen- 
ley in  July,  you  know, —  the  boat  is  entered  for  the 
Lady's  Plate, —  and  then  he  comes  home  with  me.  He 
wants  to  shoot  my  father's  birds  in  August  and  see 
a  little  of  English  country  life  before  he  settles  down 
to  his  law  work  in  America." 


48         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Belle  was  silent  for  a  few  moments.  She  wished 
that  this  wonderful  week  could  be  extended  over  the 
whole  of  her  holidays.  She  knew,  and  was  really  a 
little  frightened  at  knowing,  that  when  she  left  Ox- 
ford the  next  day  she  would  leave  behind  her  a  heart 
that  had  hitherto  been  quite  untouched.  She  was 
amazed  and  even  a  little  annoyed  to  find  that  a  mere 
week  had  brought  about  such  a  revolution  in  all  her 
feelings  and  in  her  whole  outlook  on  life.  She  had 
meant  to  have  a  perfectly  wonderful  time  before  fall- 
ing in  love. 

"  I  suppose,"  she  said,  "  that  we  shan't  hear  any- 
thing of  you  until  we  see  you  again,  unless, —  unless 
you  write  sometimes  to  mother  and  tell  her  how  you 
are  and  what  Peter  is  doing." 

Kenyon  didn't  even  smile.  "  Peter  will  write  to 
your  mother  once  a  week,  as  usual  —  he's  very  con- 
sistent —  and  I'll  get  him  to  put  in  a  postscript  about 
me,  if  you  like.  I  shall  have  some  difficulty  in  pre- 
senting myself  from  writing  to  you  from  time  to 
time,  although  I'm  a  child  in  the  art  of  letter-writing." 

"  Why  should  you  prevent  it  ?  I  should  simply  love 
to  have  your  letters." 

"But  isn't  your  mother  a  little  old-fashioned?" 

"Maybe,"  said  Belle,  "but  does  that  matter? 
You've  not  met  any  American  girls  before  —  that's 
easy  to  see.  We  do  just  what  we  like,  and  if  our 
mothers  don't  agree  they  don't  dare  to  say  so.  Shall 
I  tell  you  why  ?  Because  it  wouldn't  make  any  differ- 
ence if  they  did." 

'  Then  I  shall  write,"  said  Kenyon,  "  and  give  you 


YOUTH  49 

brief  but  eloquent  descriptions  of  English  weather, 
English  politics  and  the  condition  of  my  liver, —  that 
is  to  say,  the  three  inevitable  topics  of  this  country." 

Belle  laughed.  "  Then  it  will  be  perfectly  safe  for 
me  to  leave  your  letters  about,"  she  said. 

"  Perfectly, —  always  supposing  that  you  censor  the 
postscripts." 

"  I'm  crazy  about  you  f "  said  Belle ;  and  this  time 
her  laugh  awoke  the  echoes  of  the  river  and  filled  a 
nightingale  near  by  with  a  pathetic  ambition  to  emu- 
late its  music. 

^  And  then  they  heard  Peter's  great  voice  shouting, 
"  N-i-c-k!  "  Whereupon  Kenyon  gathered  himself  to- 
gether, not  unpleased  at  being  disturbed,  stood  up 
gracefully  and  pulled  back  into  the  main  stream. 
"The  call  of  duty,"  he  said — "such  is  life."  It  was 
consistent  with  his  policy  to  conduct  this  most  pleasant 
affair  by  instalments. 

When  he  saw  the  other  punt  he  asked  Peter,  with  a 
touch  of  beautiful  petulance,  why  he  had  deliberately 
lost  them,  and  turned  a  deaf  ear  to  Graham's  idiotic 
chuckle. 

The  landing  stage  was  in  the  shadow,  which  was 
just  as  well.  When  Kenyon  gave  his  hand  to  Belle 
to  help  her  out  of  the  punt,  he  drew  her  close  against 
him  and  with  a  touch  of  passion  as  unexpected  as  the 
sudden  flash  of  a  searchlight  across  a  dark  sky  left  a 
kiss  on  her  lips  that  took  her  breath  away. 

All  the  way  back  to  the  hotel  she  hung  on  Peter's 
arm  and  dared  not  trust  herself  to  speak.  For  the 
first  time  in  her  young  life  she  had  caught  a  glimpse 


50          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

of  its  meaning.  It  left  her  strangely  moved  and 
thrilled. 

Little  Mrs.  Guthrie  walked  back  with  Kenyon,  very 
proud  of  the  fact  that  he  was  Peter's  friend. 

Poor  little  mother ! 


VIII 

ON  the  steps  of  the  Randolph  Hotel,  Mrs.  Guthrie 
turned  to  Kenyon  and  asked  him,  with  one  of  her  most 
motherly  smiles,  to  have  some  supper  with  them.  Tel- 
egraphing quickly  to  Peter  and  Graham  that  they  were 
not  to  accept  the  invitation,  Kenyon  said :  "  Nothing 
would  give  me  greater  pleasure  —  absolutely  nothing. 
Unfortunately  Peter  and  I  have  already  accepted  an 
invitation  from  two  of  our  Dons  and  we  cannot 
possibly  get  out  of  this  dull  but  profitable  hour." 

"How  very  disappointing!"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie. 

"How  silly!"  said  Belle. 

Betty  merely  said,  "Oh!  "  but  the  rest  of  her  sen- 
tence was  condensed  into  one  quick  look  at  Peter. 

Peter,  utterly  without  guile,  turned  round  to  Nich- 
olas Kenyon  in  blank  amazement.  "  It's  the  first  I've 
heard  of  it,"  he  said.  "  What  on  earth  do  you  mean? 
Two  of  the  Dons  ?  Who  are  they  ?  " 

But  Kenyon  was  an  artist  and  a  strategist,  and 
therefore  a  liar.  "  My  dear  old  boy !  What  would 
you  do  without  me?  I'm  your  diary,  your 'secretary, 
your  guide,  philosopher  and  friend.  If  you've  forgot- 
ten the  engagement  I  certainly  haven't."  And  he 


YOUTH  51 

shot  at  Peter  a  swift  and  subtle  wink,  in  which  he  in- 
cluded Graham. 

Scenting  adventure  and  gathering  that  the  two  Dons 
were  in  all  probability  coming  from  the  chorus  of 
"  The  Pirates  of  Penzance,"  Graham  joined  in  quickly. 
"  I  suppose  I  can't  come  and  listen  humbly  to  the 
learned  conversation  of  these  two  professors?  " 

"But  why  not?"  said  Kenyon.  "No  doubt  you 
can  tell  them  more  about  Wall  Street  in  five  minutes 
than  they  would  ever  learn  in  their  lives.  Therefore, 
dear  Mrs.  Guthrie,  I'm  afraid  we  must  all  say  '  good- 
night.' We'll  rejoin  you  in  the  morning  for  breakfast 
as  arranged,  and  wind  up  what's  been  the  pleasantest 
week  of  my  life,  by  driving  out  to  Woodstock  for 
lunch." 

It  was  all  done  in  the  most  masterly  manner,  and 
when  the  three  men  left  the  hotel  arm  in  arm  they 
were  not  guided  by  Kenyon  toward  St.  Giles,  but  to 
the  theatre,  where  the  curtain  was  just  about  to  fall 
with  the  last  act. 

"What's  all  this?"  asked  Peter,  impatiently. 
"  Mother  had  set  her  heart  upon  having  us  to  supper." 

"  Mother  has  had  us  all  day,"  replied  Kenyon. 
"  Bear  in  mind  the  fact  that  there  are  other  women  in 
the  world  to  whom  we  owe  a  little  gallantry.  You  and 
Graham  are  going  to  eat  Welsh  Rabbit  at  the  some- 
what humble  rooms  of  my  little  friends,  Lottie  Law- 
rence and  Billy  Seymour." 

"  I'll  see  you  damned  first!  "  said  Peter.  "  I've  no 
use  for  these  people.  Come  on,  Graham,  let's  go  back." 

Kenyon's  face  was  wreathed  in  smiles.     "  It  can't 


52          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

be  done,  dear  lad,"  he  said.  "  Your  mother  would  be 
the  last  person  on  earth  to  permit  you  to  be  discourte- 
ous to  our  two  distinguished  Dons,  and  by  this  time 
in  all  human  probability  Betty  will  be  preparing  for 
bed." 

Peter  had  been  building  all  his  hopes  on  another 
hour  with  Betty.  She  was  leaving  Oxford  with  his 
people  the  next  afternoon  and  he  wanted  above  all 
things,  however  incoherently,  to  let  her  know  some- 
thing of  the  state  of  his  feelings.  He  had  never  been 
so  angry  with  Kenyon  before.  "  Curse  you !  "  he 
said.  "  You've  spoiled  everything.  If  you  must  play 
about  with  these  chorus  girls  why  can't  you  do  it 
alone?  Why  drag  me  in?  " 

Kenyon's  eyes  narrowed.  "  Only  the  angels  die 
young,  Peter,  my  friend,"  he  said.  "  As  I've  been 
obliged  to  tell  you  before,  you  stand  a  pretty  good 
chance  of  an  early  demise.  Have  you  ever  heard  the 
word  '  priggish  '  ?  For  a  whole  week  I've  played  the 
game  by  you  and  devoted  myself,  lock,  stock  and  bar- 
rel, to  your  family.  Mere  sportsmanship  demands 
that  you  make  some  slight  return  to  me  by  joining  my 
little  party  to-night.  Don't  you  agree  with  me, 
Graham?" 

Graham's  vanity  was  vastly  appealed  to  by  the 
fact  that  this  perfect  man  of  the  world  had  taken 
him  into  his  intimacy.  Hitherto  he  hadn't  met  Eng- 
lish chorus  girls.  He  rather  liked  the  idea.  "  Why," 
he  said,  "  I  can't  see  why  we  shouldn't  go.  I'm  with 
you,  anyway.  Come  on,  Peter.  Be  a  sport." 

But  Peter  held  his  ground.     He  had  all  the  more 


YOUTH  53 

reason  for  so  doing  because  he  had  met  Betty.  "  All 
right!"  he  said.  "You  two  can  do  what  you  jolly 
well  like.  Cut  me  out  of  it.  I  shall  turn  in.  If 
that's  being  priggish  —  fine.  Good-night!" 

He  wheeled  round  and  marched  off,  and  as  he  passed 
beneath  the  windows  of  the  Randolph  Hotel  he  drew 
up  short  for  a  moment  and  with  a  touch  of  knight- 
liness  which  was  quite  unself-conscious  he  bared  his 
head  beneath  the  window  of  the  room  in  which  be 
believed  that  Betty  was  to  sleep,  but  which,  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  harboured  a  short,  fat,  wheezy  Anglo-In- 
dian with  a  head  as  bald  as  a  billiard  ball. 

Kenyon  disguised  his  annoyance  under  an  air  of 
characteristic  imperturbability.  "  Well,  that's  our 
Peter  to  the  life,"  he  said,  taking  Graham's  eager  arm. 
"  He's  a  sort  of  Don  Quix9te  —  a  very  pure  and  per- 
fect person.  One  of  these  days  he's  likely  to  come 
an  unholy  cropper,  and  that's  to  my  way  of  thinking 
what  he  most  needs.  I  don't  agree  with  a  man's  being 
a  total  abstainer  in  anything.  It  narrows  him  and 
makes  him  provincial.  Then,  too,  a  man  who  fancies 
himself  as  better  than  his  fellows  is  apt  to  wear  a  halo 
under  his  hat,  and  that  disgusting  trick  ruins  friend- 
ship and  leads  to  a  hasty  and  ill-considered  marriage 
with  the  first  good  actress  who  catches  him  on  the  hop 
and  makes  use  of  his  lamentable  ignorance.  Come 
along,  brother,  we'll  see  life  together." 

"Fine!"  said  Graham.  "Me  for  life  all  the 
time." 

So  these  two, —  the  one  curiously  old  and  the  other 
dangerously  young, —  made  their  way  to  the  stage  door 


54          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

of  the  Theatre  Royal  and  waited  among  the  little 
crowd  of  undergraduates  for  the  moment  when  the 
ladies  of  the  chorus  should  have  retouched  their  make- 
up and  be  ready  for  further  theatricalisms. 

Lottie  Lawrence  and  Billy  Seymour  were  the  first 
out.  The  latter's  greeting  was  exuberant.  "  What- 
ho,  Nick!  Where's  the  blooming  giant  you  said  you 
were  going  to  bring?" 

"  Otherwise  engaged,  dear  Billy ;  but  permit  me  to 
introduce  to  you  a  financial  magnate  from  the  golden 
city  of  New  York." 

Billy  was  young  and  slim  and  so  tight-skirted  that 
her  walk  was  almost  like  that  of  a  Chinese  Princess. 
Even  under  the  modest  light  of  the  stage  door-keep- 
er's box  her  lips  gleamed  crimsonly  and  her  long  eye- 
lashes stuck  out  separately  in  black  surprise.  Her 
small  round  face  was  plastered  thickly  with  powder. 
She  was  very  alluring  to  the  very  young.  Her  friend 
had  come  from  an  exactly  similar  mould  and  might 
have  been  a  twin  but  for  her  manner,  which  was  that 
of  the  violet  —  the  modest  violet  —  on  a  river's  brim. 

Kenyon  hailed  a  cab,  gave  the  man  the  address  in 
Wellington  Square  and  sat  himself  between  the  two 
girls,  with  an  arm  round  each. 

Billy  Seymour  had  taken  in  Graham  with  one  expert 
glance  of  minute  examination.  "  Graham  Guthrie, 
eh  ?  "  she  said.  "  It  smacks  of  Caledonia,  bag-pipes 
and  the  braes  and  banks  o'  bonnie  Boon.  I  take  it 
your  ancestors  went  over  on  the  S.  S.  Mayflower,  of 
the  White  Star  Line  —  that  gigantic  vessel  which  fol- 
lowed the  beckoning  finger  of  Columbus  —  and  started 


YOUTH  55 

the  race  which  invented  sky-scrapers  and  the  cuspi- 
dors." 

Graham  let  out  a  howl  of  laughter  and  told  himself 
that  he  was  in  for  a  good  evening,  especially  as  the 
ladies'  knees  were  very  friendly. 

Lottie  Lawrence  placed  her  head  on  Kenyon's 
shoulder,  sighed  a  little  and  said :  "  Oh,  I'm  so  tired 
and  so  hungry ;  and  I've  a  thirst  I  wouldn't  sell  for  a 
tenner." 

Kenyon  tightened  his  hold.  "  All  those  things  shall 
be  remedied,  little  one,"  he  said.  "  Have  no  fear." 

The  first  things  which  met  their  eyes  when  they  en- 
tered the  sitting-room  of  the  sordid  little  house  in 
which  a  series  of  theatricals  had  lodged  from  time 
immemorial,  were  a  half-dozen  bottles  of  champagne 
—  sent  in  by  Nick's  order.  The  two  girls  showed 
their  appreciation  for  his  tactfulness  in  different  ways. 
Billy  fell  upon  one  of  the  bottles  as  though  it  were 
her  long-lost  sister,  pressed  it  to  her  bosom  and  placed 
a  passionate  kiss  upon  its  label;  while  Lottie,  with  an 
eloquent  gesture,  immediately  handed  Graham  a  rather 
battered  corkscrew.  "  Help  me  to  the  bubbly,  boy," 
she  said.  "  My  throat  is  like  a  limekiln." 

All  the  clocks  of  the  City  of  Spires  were  striking 
three  as  Kenyon  and  Graham  supported  each  other  out 
into  the  quiet  and  deserted  street.  There  was  much 
powder  on  Graham's  coat  and  a  patch  of  crimson  on 
Kenyon's  left  cheek. 

"  Life  with  a  big  L,  Graham,  my  boy,"  said  Kenyon 
a  little  thickly. 


56          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  A  hell  of  a  big  L,"  said  Graham,  with  a  very  much 
too  loud  laugh  at  his  feeble  joke.  "  You  certainly  do 
know  your  way  about." 

"  And  most  of  the  short  cuts,"  said  Kenyon  dryly. 
"  Presently  I  shall  scale  the  wall  of  St.  John's,  climb 
through  the  window  of  one  of  our  fellows  who's  about 
to  take  holy  orders,  and  wind  up  the  night  in  the  hos- 
pitable arms  of  Morpheus."  This  eventually  Graham 
watched  him  do,  with  infinite  delight,  and  was  still 
wearing  a  smile  of  self-congratulation  as  he  passed 
the  door  of  his  mother's  bedroom  in  the  hotel  and 
entered  his  own. 

His  father  heard  the  heavy  footsteps  as  they  went 
along  the  passage,  but  imagined  that  they  were  those 
of  the  night  watchman  on  his  rounds. 

Fate  is  the  master  of  irony. 


IX 

THE  following  morning  at  eight  o'clock  Peter,  as 
fit  as  a  fiddle,  stalked  into  Kenyon's  bedroom  and 
flung  up  the  blind.  The  sun  poured  in  through 
the  open  window.  Innumerable  sparrows  twittered 
among  the  trees  in  the  gardens  and  scouts  were  mov- 
ing energetically  about  the  quad.  From  the  other 
windows  the  sounds  of  renewed  life  were  coming. 
The  great  beehive  of  a  college  was  about  to  begin  a 
new  and  strenuous  day. 

Kenyon  was  sleeping  heavily  with  a  blanket  drawn 
about  his  ears.  His  clothes  were  all  over  the  floor 


YOUTH  57 

and  a  tumbler  one-fourth  filled  with  whiskey  stood 
on  the  dressing-table  among  a  large  collection  of  ivory- 
backed  brushes,  links,  studs,  tie-pins  and  other  para- 
phernalia which  belong  to  men  of  Kenyon's  type, — 
the  bloods  of  Oxford.  With  a  chuckle,  Peter  dipped 
a  large  sponge  in  the  water  of  the  hip-bath  which  had 
been  placed  ready  on  the  floor,  and  throwing  back  the 
blanket  squeezed  its  contents  all  over  Kenyon's  well- 
cut  face. 

The  effect  was  instantaneous.  The  sleeper  awoke, 
and  cursed.  Peter's  howl  of  laughter  at  the  sight  of 
this  pale  blinking  man  with  his  delicate  blue  silk 
pajamas  all  wet  round  the  neck  advertised  the  fact  to 
the  whole  college  that  he  was  up  and  about. 

Kenyon  got  slowly  out  of  bed.  "  There  are  fools 
—  damned  fools  —  and  Peter  Guthrie,"  he  said 
quietly.  "  What's  the  time?  " 

"  Time  for  you  to  get  up,  shave  and  bathe,  if  you 
want  to  breakfast  at  the  Randolph.  How  late  were 
you  last  night?  " 

"  Haven't  a  notion,"  said  Kenyon.  "  The  first 
faint  touch  of  dawn  was  coming  over  the  horizon,  so 
far  as  I  remember,  when  your  little  brother  watched 
me  climb  through  the  window  of  the  man  Rivers,  upon 
whose  '  tummie '  I  planted  my  foot.  For  a  man 
who's  about  to  enter  the  Church  he  has  an  astounding 
vocabulary  of  gutter  English.  You  look  abominably 
fit,  old  boy  —  the  simple  life,  eh?  Heigh-ho!  — 
Manipulate  this  machine  for  me  while  I'm  doing  my 
hair."  He  picked  up  the  small  black  case  of  his 
safety-razor  and  threw  it  at  Peter,  who  caught  it. 


58         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Then  he  got  into  a  very  beautiful  silk  dressing-gown, 
stuck  his  feet  into  a  pair  of  heelless  red  morocco  slip- 
pers, and  with  infinite  pains  and  accuracy  made  a  cen- 
tre parting  in  his  fair  hair,  in  which  there  was  a  slight 
natural  curl. 

From  his  comfortable  position  on  the  foot  of  the 
bed  Peter  watched  his  friend  shave, —  a  performance 
through  which  he  went  with  characteristic  neatness. 
It  was  a  very  different  performance  from  the  one 
through  which  Peter  was  in  the  habit  of  going.  Soap 
flew  all  round  this  untidy  man,  giving  the  scout  much 
extra  work  in  his  cleaning-up  process. 

Kenyon  didn't  intend  to  enter  into  any  details  as 
to  the  orgy  of  the  night  before.  He  knew  from  pre- 
vious experience  that  Peter's  sympathy  was  not  with 
him.  For  many  reasons  he  desired  to  stand  well  with 
his  friend,  especially  looking  to  the  fact  that  he  needed 
an  immediate  loan.  One  or  two  of  his  numerous 
creditors  were  pressing  for  part  payment.  So  he  let 
the  matter  drop  and  took  the  opportunity  to  talk  like 
a  father  to  Peter  on  another  point  which  had  grown 
out  of  the  visit  of  his  people.  "  Tell  me,"  he  said, 
"  what  is  precisely  the  state  of  your  feelings  in  re- 
gard to  your  sister's  friend?  It  seems  to  me  that 
you're  getting  a  bit  sloppy  in  that  direction.  Am  I 
right?" 

"  No,"  said  Peter,  "  '  sloppy '  isn't  the  word." 

"Oh!  Well,  then,  what  is  the  word?  I  may  be 
able  to  advise  you." 

"  I  don't  want  your  advice,"  said  Peter.  "  My 
mind  is  made  up." 


YOUTH  59 

Kenyon  turned  round.  "  Is  that  so  ?  Quick 
work."' 

Peter  nodded.  "  It's  always  quick  when  it's  inev- 
itable." 

"  Oho !     What  have  we  here  —  romance  ?  " 

"  Yes ;  I  think  so,"  said  Peter  quietly. 

"  Who'd  have  thought  it  ?  Our  friend  Peter  has 
met  his  soul-mate!  Out  of  the  great  crowd  he 
has  chosen  the  mother  of  his  children.  It  is  to 
laugh!" 

"Think  so?"  said  Peter.     "I  don't." 

Kenyon  put  down  his  razor  and  stood  in  front  of 
the  man  with  whom  he  had  lived  for  several  years 
and  who  had  now  apparently  come  up  against  a  big 
moment  in  his  life.  It  didn't  suit  him  that  Peter 
should  be  seriously  in  love  yet.  He  looked  to  his 
friend  to  provide  him  with  a  certain  amount  of  leisure 
in  the  future.  His  plans  would  all  go  wrong  if  he 
had  to  share  him  with  someone  else.  He  had  imagined 
that  his  friend  was  only  temporarily  gone  on  this  little 
girl  whose  brief  entry  into  Oxford  had  helped  to  make 
Eight's  week  very  pleasant.  It  was  his  duty  to  find 
out  exactly  how  Peter  stood. 

"  Do  you  mean  to  tell  me,"  he  asked,  "  that  you've 
proposed  to  Betty  Townsend  ?  " 

"  Not  yet,"  said  Peter,  "  but  I'm  going  to  this  morn- 
ing—  that  is  if  I  have  the  pluck." 

"  My  dear  fellow,"  said  Kenyon,  with  a  genuine 
earnestness,  "  don't  do  it.  I've  no  doubt  she'll  jump 
at  you,  being  -under  the  influence  of  this  place  and 
seeing  you  as  a  small  hero  here;  but  take  the  advice 


60         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

of  a  man  who  knows  and  bring  caution  to  your  rescue. 
What'll  happen  if  you  tie  yourself  up  to  this  girl? 
After  all,  you  can't  possibly  be  in  love  with  her  — 
that's  silly.  You're  under  the  influence  of  a  few  sil- 
ver nights,  and  that  most  dangerous  of  all  things  — 
propinquity.  Dally  with  her  of  course,  kiss  her  and 
write  her  letters  in  which  you  quote  the  soft  stuff  of 
the  poets.  That'll  provide  you  with  much  quiet 
amusement  and  assist  you  in  the  acquisition  of  a  liter- 
ary style;  but,  for  God's  sake,  don't  be  serious. 
You're  too  young.  You've  not  sown  your  wild  oats. 
What's  the  use  of  taking  a  load  of  responsibility  on 
your  shoulders  before  you're  obliged  to  do  so?  I'm 
talking  to  you  like  a  father,  old  man,  and  I've  the 
right." 

"  Oh  yes,"  said  Peter,  "  you've  the  right  —  no  man 
better  —  but  you  and  I  look  at  things  differently.  I 
want  the  responsibility  of  this  girl.  I  want  someone 
to  work  for, —  an  impetus  —  an  ultimate  end.  It  may 
seem  idiotic  to  you  that  I  know  the  right  girl  directly 
I  see  her,  but  all  the  same  it's  a  fact.  You  see  my 
undergraduate  days  are  almost  over.  When  I  go 
home  in  the  fall  I  shall  start  earning  my  living.  What 
am  I  going  to  work  for?  A  home,  of  course,  and  a 
wife  and  all  that  that  means.  If  that's  what  you  call 
romance,  thank  you,  it's  exactly  what  I  want.  Do  you 
get  me?  " 

Kenyon  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  Then  I  don't  see 
that  there's  anything  more  to  be  said.  Does  all  this 
mean  that  you're  going  to  chuck  me?  Supposing 
Betty  accepts  you?  Are  you  going  to  dog  her  foot- 


YOUTH  61 

steps  for  the  rest  of  the  summer  and  leave  me  in  the 
cart?" 

"  Oh  Lord,  no !  "  said  Peter. 

"  Thank  God  for  small  mercies !  And  now  if  you'll 
give  me  a  little  elbow-room  I'll  have  my  bath." 

"Right-o!"  said  Peter.  "Buck  up!  Breakfast 
at  nine  o'clock." 

He  went  out,  not  singing  as  usual  but  with  a  cu- 
rious quietness  and  a  strange  light  dancing  in  his 
eyes. 

Kenyon  was  left  the  sole  master  of  that  little  bed- 
room. As  he  finished  dressing  he  marshalled  his 
thoughts  and  into  them  entered  the  figure  of  a  certain 
very  beautiful  person  who  lived  in  a  cottage  on  the 
borders  of  his  father's  estate.  Before  now  she  had 
twisted  young  men,  quite  as  romantic  as  Peter,  out  of 
their  engagements  to  simple  little  girls.  He  would 
see  that  she  worked  her  wiles  on  Peter.  He  didn't 
intend  that  his  friend  should  devote  himself  to  any 
person  except  Nicholas  Kenyon  so  long  as  he  could 
prevent  it. 

X 

IT  was  a  rather  curious  meal, —  this  final  breakfast 
at  the  Randolph  Hotel.  There  were  several  under- 
currents of  feeling  which  seemed  to  disturb  the  atmos- 
phere like  cross  winds.  The  Doctor  and  Mrs.  Guthrie 
were  genuinely  sorry  that  the  week  had  come  to  an 
end.  It  was  one  which  would  be  filled  with  memo- 
ries. Graham  would  very  willingly  have  remained  at 


62          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Oxford  as  long  as  Kenyon  did.  He  had  fallen  a 
complete  victim  to  the  attractions  of  this  master  of 
psychology.  He  regarded  him  as  the  very  last  word 
in  expert  worldliness.  He  paid  him  the  highest  tribute 
that  he  considered  it  was  possible  for  one  man  to  pay 
another,  by  calling  him  "  a  good  sport,"  and  he  looked 
forward  with  enormous  pleasure  to  the  time  when  he 
would  be  able  to  show  Kenyon  the  night  side  of  New 
York,  with  which  he  had  himself  begun  to  be  well 
acquainted. 

As  to  the  two  girls,  wonderful  things  had  happened 
to  both  of  them  during  that  emotional,  stirring,  pic- 
turesque and  altogether  "  different  "  week.  It  seemed 
almost  incredible  to  them  they  had  been  in  that  old 
town  for  so  short  a  time,  during  which,  however,  their 
little  plans  —  their  girlish  point  of  view  —  had  un- 
dergone absolute  revolution.  The  high-spirited  Belle, 
who  had  hitherto  gone  through  life  with  a  consistent 
exuberance  and  rather  thoughtless  joy,  was  rendered 
uncharacteristically  serious  at  the  knowledge  that  she 
would  not  see  Nicholas  Kenyon  again  for  some 
months.  Not  for  a  moment  did  she  regret  the  fact 
that  she  had  fallen  badly  in  love  with  him.  It  was  a 
new  sensation  for  her,  and  young  as  she  was,  it  was 
the  new  thing  that  counted.  Her  mind  was  filled  with 
dreams.  In  imagination  she  walked  from  one  series 
of  pictures  into  another  and  all  were  touched  with 
excitement,  exhilaration  and  a  sense  of  having  won 
something,  the  possession  of  which  all  her  friends 
would  envy  her. 

In  going  over  in  her  mind  all  that  Kenyon  had  said 


YOUTH  63 

to  her,  she  could  not  put  her  finger  on  any  actual 
declaration  on  his  part;  but  his  subtle  assumption  of 
possession,  the  way  in  which  he  touched  her  hand  and 
looked  at  her  over  other  people's  heads  with  eyes  which 
seemed  to  embrace  her,  seemed  to  her  to  be  far  more 
satisfactory  than  any  conventional  set  of  words  ordi- 
nary under  such  circumstances.  Then,  too,  there  was 
that  wonderful  and  sudden  kiss  on  the  landing  stage 
in  the  shadow.  Why,  there  was  no  doubt  about  it. 
She  had,  like  Caesar,  come  and  seen  and  conquered. 
She  was  to  be  the  Hon.  Mrs.  Nicholas  Kenyon, 
daughter-in-law  of  Lord  Shropshire,  of  Thrapstone- 
Wynyates.  What  a  delightful  surprise  for  father  and 
mother,  and  how  proud  they  would  be  of  her ! 

Betty  knew  that  Peter  intended  to  make  her  his 
wife.  She  knew  it  and  was  happy.  His  very  inco- 
herence had  been  more  eloquent  to  her  than  the  well- 
rounded  sentences  of  all  the  heroes  of  her  favorite 
novels,  and  if  he  never  said  another  word  before  she 
left,  she  would  be  satisfied.  In  her  heart  there  was 
the  sensation  of  one  who  had  come  to  the  end  of  a  long 
road  and  now  stood  in  a -great  wide  open  space  on 
which  the  sun  fell  warmly  and  with  great  beauty. 

Not  much  was  said  by  anyone,  and  the  question  of 
the  afternoon  train  which  was  to  leave  at  four-thirty 
was  consistently  avoided  by  them  all. 

Breakfast  over,  the  whole  party  followed  Kenyon 
into  the  street,  where  two  cars  were  waiting  for  the 
trip  to  Woodstock.  They  were  to  lunch  at  the  old  inn 
which  stood  beneath  the  gnarled  branches  of  the  oaks 
that  had  sheltered  the  Round  Heads  and  Royalists. 


64         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

The  first  car  was  Kenyon's  roadster,  in  which  he 
placed  Mrs.  Guthrie,  the  Doctor  and  Graham.  He  had 
intended  that  Betty  should  sit  by  his  side  as  he  drove, 
and  that  Peter  should  take  Belle  in  his  two-seater. 
But  Master  Peter  was  too  quick  for  him  this  time. 
He  had  touched  Betty  on  the  arm  and  said :  "  You're 
coming  with  me."  And  before  Kenyon  could  frame  a 
sentence  to  break  up  this  arrangement  these  two  were 
off  together  with  the  complete  disregard  for  speed 
limits  which  was  peculiar  to  the  Oxford  undergradu- 
ate. Kenyon  had  the  honesty  to  say  about  this  to 
himself  that  it  was  well  done,  but  all  the  same  he  was 
immensely  annoyed.  As  he  drove  off  with  Belle  on 
the  front  seat  he  was  not,  for  at  least  a  mile,  a  very 
talkative  companion.  Belle  put  his  silence  down  to 
the  fact  that  she  was  going  away  that  afternoon. 

Along  St.  Giles,  past  the  burial  ground,  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church,  Somerville,  and  into  the  Woodstock 
road  as  far  as  the  Radcliffe  Infirmary,  Peter  kept  the 
lead,  and  then  the  big  car  overtook  him  and  left  him 
behind.  Graham  waved  his  hand  and  shouted  some- 
thing which  Peter  didn't  catch.  It  was  probably 
facetious.  As  far  as  Wolvercote  Peter  kept  in  touch 
with  the  car  in  front,  when  he  began  to  fall  gradually 
behind.  He  had  a  plan  in  the  back  of  his  head. 

The  morning  seemed  to  suit  all  that  he  had  to  say, 
if  he  found  himself  able  to  say  it.  The  earth  was 
warm  with  the  sun.  The  hedges  and  trees  were  still 
in  the  first  fresh  vigor  of  early  summer.  Everywhere 
birds  sang  and  were  busy  with  their  young. 

Peter  pulled  up  short  at  the  edge  of  a  spinney. 


YOUTH  65 

"  Let's  get  out  of  here,"  he  said,  "  I  want  to  show  you 
a  corking  little  bit  of  country."  And  Betty  obeyed 
without  a  word.  She  rather  liked  being  ordered  about 
by  this  big  square-shouldered  person. 

They  didn't  go  far, —  hardly,  in  fact,  fifty  yards 
from  the  car, —  and  when  they  came  to  a  small  open- 
ing among  the  beeches  where  bracken  grew  and  "  bread 
and  cheese  "  covered  the  soft  turf  with  their  little 
yellow  heads,  Peter  said :  "  Sit  down ;  I  want  to 
speak  to  you." 

And  again  Betty  obeyed  without  a  word.  It  was 
coming  —  she  knew  that  it  was  coming  —  and  the 
only  thing  she  was  afraid  about  was  that  Peter  would 
hear  the  quick  beat  of  her  heart. 

He  laid  himself  full  stretch  at  her  feet,  threw  off  his 
cap  and  ran  his  fingers  through  his  hair.  "  You  know 
this  place,"  he  said. 

"  I  ?     No,  I've  never  been  here  before." 

"Yes,  you  have.  You've  been  here  with  your 
friends.  They  come  out  every  night  from  the  first 
of  May  until  the  first  of  October.  Can't  you  see  the 
marks  their  feet  have  made  as  they  danced  here  in  the 
ring?  It's  awfully  queer.  This  is  the  first  place  I 
came  to  after  I  got  to  Oxford  —  all  the  leaves  were 
red  —  and  I  sat  here  one  afternoon  alone  and  won- 
dered how  long  it  would  be  before  I  should  look  up 
and  see  you.  I've  often  come  here  since,  winter  and 
summer,  and  listened  for  sticks  to  crackle  as  you  came 
along  through  the  trees  to  find  me.  Why  don't  you 
laugh?" 

"Why  should  I?" 


66          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  I  knew  you  wouldn't.  If  you  had  it  wouldn't 
have  been  you." 

He  turned  himself  round  on  to  his  elbows  and 
looked  up  at  her,  and  remained  looking  and  looking. 
And  Betty  looked  back.  Her  heart  was  beating  so 
loudly  that  it  seemed  to  her  that  someone  was  whack- 
ing a  carpet  somewhere  with  a  stick.  She  wondered 
whether  she  would  be  able  to  hear  Peter  when  he  spoke 
again, —  if  ever  he  did. 

And  Peter  said :  "I'm  going  to  begin  to  be  a  man 
exactly  five  months  from  to-day.  That  is  to  say,  I'm 
going  into  a  law  office  in  New  York  to  make  a  begin- 
ning. I'm  going  to  work  like  the  dickens.  Do  you 
know  why  ?  " 

Betty  shook  her  head  and  then  nodded.  He  was  a 
long  time  coming  to  the  point.  If  he  wasn't  quick 
she'd  simply  have  to  scream.  Her  heart  was  up  in  her 
throat  —  it  was  most  uncomfortable. 

Peter  went  on.  Somehow  words  came  easy  to  him. 
The  earth  was  so  friendly  and  so  motherly  and  so  very 
kind,  and  after  all  this  was  his  spot  and  she  was  there 
at  last.  "  I  forget  the  number  of  the  house,"  he  said, 
"  but  up  on  the  eighth  floor  of  it,  facing  south,  there's 
a  most  corking  apartment.  The  rooms  are  large  and 
can  be  filled  with  big  furniture  and  enormous  book- 
cases. I'm  going  to  work  to  get  that.  I  don't  know 
how  long  it'll  take,  but  I'm  going  to  ask  you  to  help 
me  to  get  it.  Will  you?" 

Betty  nodded  again.  Someone  was  beating  the  car- 
pet in  a  most  violent  manner. 

Peter,  without  another  word,  sprang  up,  put  two 


YOUTH  67 

large  strong  hands  under  Betty's  elbows  and  set  her 
on  her  feet.  She  came  up  to  the  top  button  of  his  coat 
and  he  held  her  there  tight  and  it  hurt  her  cheek.  But 
oh,  how  fine  and  broad  the  chest  was  behind  it  and  how 
good  it  was  to  nestle  there.  She  heard  him  say  much 
that  she  forgot  then,  but  remembered  afterwards  — 
simple  boyish  things  expressed  with  deep  sincerity  and 
a  sort  of  throb  —  outpourings  of  pent-up  feelings  — 
not  in  the  very  least  incoherent,  but  all  definite  and 
very  good.  And  there  they  stayed  for  what  appeared 
to  be  a  long  time.  The  man  with  the  carpet  had  gone 
away,  but  without  looking  up  Betty  knew  that  there 
were  hundreds  of  little  people  dancing  around  them  in 
the  ring  and  the  little  clearing  full  of  the  yellow  heads 
of  wild  flowers  seemed  to  have  become  that  great  open 
space  and  out  of  it,  between  an  avenue  of  old  trees, 
stretched  the  wide  road  which  led  to, —  the  word  was 
the  only  one  in  the  song  that  filled  her  brain, —  moth- 
erhood !  Motherhood ! 

A  rabbit  ran  past  them  frightened,  and  Betty  sprang 
away.  "  Peter!  What  will  the  others  say?  " 

Peter  shook  himself  and  his  great  laugh  awoke  the 
echoes  of  the  woods.  "  I  don't  care  what  anybody 
says,"  he  answered.  "  Do  you?  " 

"  Yes.     Let's  go.     We  shall  be  late  for  lunch." 

And  Peter  picked  her  up,  carried  her  to  the  car, 
kissed  her,  put  her  in,  and  drove  away. 


68         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 


XI 

PETER  and  Kenyon  left  the  station  arm  in  arm. 
They  had  watched  the  train  round  the  corner  and  dis- 
appear. Many  hands  had  waved  to  the  crowd  of  un- 
dergraduates who  had  come  to  see  their  people  and 
friends  off.  Peter  had  stood  bareheaded  with  his  hand 
still  tingling  with  the  touch  of  Betty's. 

They  walked  slowly  back  to  college,  each  busy  with 
his  thoughts.  Exultation  filled  Peter's  mind.  Ken- 
yon  was  wondering  how  much  he  could  touch  Peter 
for.  In  the  procession  of  returning  undergraduates 
they  made  their  way  under  the  railway  bridge  and 
along  the  sun-bathed  but  rather  slummy  cobblestone 
road  over  which  the  tram-cars  ran.  They  passed  the 
row  of  little  red  brick  houses  —  most  of  which  were 
shops  —  and  the  factory,  stammering  smoke,  and 
turned  into  the  back  way  which  led  by  a  short  cut  to 
Worcester. 

Oxford  had  resumed  her  normal  atmosphere.  Fa- 
thers and  mothers,  uncles,  guardians,  brothers,  sisters 
and  cousins,  who  had  all  descended  upon  the  town,  had 
departed.  No  longer  were  the  old  winding  streets  set 
alight  by  the  many  colored  frocks  of  pretty  girls,  nor 
were  they  any  longer  stirred  into  a  temporary  bustle 
by  the  great  influx  of  motor-cars.  Undergraduates 
held  possession  once  more  and  with  their  peculiar 
adaptability  were  making  hasty  preparations  for  the 
long  vacation. 

Peter  led  the  way  to  his  sitter,  loaded  his  inevitable 


YOUTH  69 

pipe,  and  sat  in  the  sun  on  the  sill  of  the  open  window. 
With  fastidious  care  Kenyon  stuck  a  cigarette  into  a 
long  meerschaum  holder  and  laid  himself  down  on  the 
settee.  He  had  worked  very  hard  during  the  week 
and  had  very  much  more  than  carried  out  his  promise 
to  Peter  to  make  himself  pleasant.  The  moment  had 
come  when  he  might  certainly  lead  the  way  up  to  his 
reward. 

Peter  took  the  words  out  of  his  friend's  mouth. 
"  What  d'you  think?  "  he  said.  "  When  I  was  saying 
good-bye  to  the  Governor  on  the  platform  he  took  me 
aside  and  gave  me  a  cheque.  He  did  it  in  his  curious 
apologetic  way  which  always  makes  me  feel  that  he's 
someone  else's  father,  and  said :  '  I  think  this  will  see 
you  through  for  a  month  or  two.'  Gee!  It's  some 
cheque,  Nick !  I  don't  think  I  shall  have  to  touch  the 
old  man  down  for  another  bob  until  I  have  to  book  my 
passage.  His  generosity  leaves  me  wordless.  I  wish 
to  God  I'd  been  able  to  say  something  nice.  As  it  was, 
I  had  to  tell  mother  to  thank  him  for  me."  He  went 
over  to  his  desk,  fished  out  a  cheque-book,  sat  down 
and  made  one  out  in  his  large  round  boyish  handwrit- 
ing. 

Kenyon  watched  him  intently.  He  hoped  that  it 
might  be  for  himself  and  for  fifty  sovereigns.  That 
amount,  carefully  split  up,  would  keep  some  of  his 
more  pressing  tradesmen  quiet  for  a  short  time. 

"Is  this  any  good  to  you,  old  man?"  said  Peter. 
He  dropped  the  cheque  on  to  Kenyon's  immaculate 
waistcoat.  It  was  for  a  hundred  pounds. 

The  master  parasite  was  taken  by  surprise  almost 


7o         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

for  the  first  time  in  his  life  and  he  was  sincerely 
touched  by  this  generosity.  "  My  dear  old  Peter ! 
This  is  really  devilish  kind  of  you!  I'm  exceedingly 
grateful.  My  exit  from  Oxford  can  now  be  made 
with  a  certain  amount  of  dignity.  I'll  add  this  amount 
to  your  other  advances,  and  you  must  trust  in  God  and 
my  luck  at  cards  to  get  it  back." 

"Oh,  that's  all  right,"  said  Peter.  "You'd  have 
done  the  same  for  me.  What's  the  good  of  friend- 
ship anyway  if  a  man  can't  share  his  bonuses  with  a 
pal  ?  Well,  well !  There  goes  another  Commem :  — 
the  last  of  them  for  us.  Everything  seems  awfully 
flat  here  without, —  without  my  people.  What  d'you 
think  of  the  Governor?  " 

Kenyon  folded  the  cheque  neatly  and  slipped  it  into 
a  small  leather  case  upon  which  his  crest  was  em- 
bossed in  gold.  It  was  one  of  the  numerous  nice 
things  for  which  he  owed.  "  Your  father,"  he  said, 
"  is  a  very  considerable  man.  I  made  a  careful  study 
of  him  and  I've  come  to  the  conclusion  that  all  he 
needs  from  you  and  Graham  is  human  treatment.  If 
he  were  my  father  I  should  buy  a  metaphorical  chisel 
and  an  easily  manipulated  hammer  and  chip  off  all  his 
shyness  bit  by  bit  as  though  it  were  concrete.  Prop- 
erly managed  there's  enough  in  Dr.  Guthrie  to  keep 
you  in  comfort  for  the  rest  of  your  life  without  doing 
a  stroke  of  work.  What  age  is  he  —  somewhere 
about  fifty-three  I  suppose  ?  In  all  human  probability 
he  is  good  —  barring  accidents  —  for  another  fifteen 
years  or  so.  Then,  duly  mourned,  and,  I  take  it,  con- 
siderably paragraphed  in  your  newspapers,  he  will  go 


YOUTH  71 

to  his  long  rest  and  you  will  come  into  your  own. 
With  even  quite  ordinary  diplomacy  you  can  use  those 
fifteen  years  to  considerable  advantage  to  yourself, — 
dallying  gently  with  life  and  adding  considerably  to 
your  experience,  making  your  headquarters  at  his 
house.  You  can  do  the  semblance  of  work  in  order 
to  satisfy  his  rather  puritanical  notion, —  but  I  can't 
see  that  there'll  be  any  need  for  you  to  sweat.  For 
instance,  become  a  poet  —  that's  easy.  There  are 
stacks  of  sonneteers  whom  you  could  imitate.  Or  you 
could  call  yourself  a  literary  man  and  do  nothing  more 
than  establish  a  sanctum-sanctorum  in  which  to  keep 
a  neat  pile  of  well-bound  manuscript  books  and  ac- 
quire a  library.  If  I  were  you  I  should  adopt  the  lat- 
ter course  —  it  sounds  well.  It'll  satisfy  the  old  man 
and  all  the  while  you're  not  writing  the  great  book 
he'll  pat  himself  on  the  back  and  congratulate  himself 
on  having  had  you  properly  educated.  During  all  this 
time  you  can  draw  from  him  a  very  nice  yearly  in- 
come, and  then  make  your  splash  when  nature  has  laid 
her  relentless  hand  upon  the  old  man's  shoulder." 

There  was  a  moment's  pause,  during  which  Peter 
looked  very  curiously  at  the  graceful  indolent  man  who 
lay  upon  his  settee.  "  If  I  didn't  know  that  you  were 
talking  for  effect,"  he  said,  "  I  should  take  you  by  the 
scruff  of  your  neck  and  the  seat  of  your  breeches  and 
hurl  you  down-stairs.  I  know  you  better  than  to 
believe  that  you  are  the  cold-blooded  brute  that  you 
make  yourself  out  to  be.  Anyhow,  we'll  not  discuss 
the  matter.  The  one  useful  thing  you  have  said  — 
and  on  which  I  shall  try  to  act  —  is  that  Graham  and 


72          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

I  must  try  to  be  more  human  with  the  Governor.  He 
deserves  it.  What's  the  program?  " 

"  For  me,"  said  Kenyon,  "  dinner  with  Lascelles  and 
bridge  to  the  early  hours.  With  good  cards  and  a 
fairly  good  partner  I  shall  hope  to  make  a  bit.  What 
are  you  going  to  do?  " 

"  I  shall  dine  in  Hall,"  said  Peter,  "  and  then  go  out 
for  a  walk." 

"  I  see."  Kenyon  got  up,  filled  his  cigarette  case 
from  Peter's  box  and  stood  with  his  back  to  the  man- 
tel-piece. "  You  proposed  to  Betty  to-day,  didn't 


you 


"  How  the  deuce  did  you  know  that  ?  " 
Kenyon  laughed.  "  My  dear  fellow,"  he  said, 
"  everybody  knows  that.  You  exuded  romance  when 
you  arrived  late  at  the  Inn.  The  very  waiter  guessed 
it,  and  was  so  stirred,  being  Swiss,  that  he  very  nearly 
poured  the  soup  down  your  mother's  neck.  And  when 
your  mother  looked  at  you  I  saw  something  come  into 
her  eyes  which  showed  me  that  she  knew  she  had  lost 
you.  I  wouldn't  be  a  mother  if  you  paid  me!  "  And 
then  he  held  out  his  hand  with  that  charm  of  which  he 
was  past-master.  "  '  Friend  that  sticketh  closer  than 
a  brother,'  three  years;  dashed  bit  of  a  slip  of  a  girl, 
one  week, —  and  where's  your  friend?  Well,  good 
luck,  Peter!  She's  a  nice  little  thing.  Dream  your 
dreams,  old  boy,  but  don't  altogether  forget  the  man 
who's  been  through  Oxford  with  you." 

Peter  grasped  the  hand  warmly.  "  Don't  be  an 
ass !  "  he  said.  "  Go  and  brush  your  back  hair.  It's 
all  sticking  up." 


YOUTH  73 

And  when  he  was  alone,  except  for  a  golden  patch 
of  evening  sun  which  had  found  its  way  through  his 
window  and  had  spilt  itself  on  his  carpet,  Peter  pulled 
out  a  little  white  glove  from  his  pocket  and  kissed  it. 

"  O  God!  "  he  said.     "  Help  me  to  become  a  man." 


XII 

No  one  knew,  because  no  one  was  told,  of  the  many 
hours  of  grief  which  little  Mrs.  Guthrie  endured  after 
she  left  Oxford.  There  were  two  reasons  for  this 
grief.  One,  the  inevitable  realization  that  the  time 
had  come  for  some  other  woman  to  take  her  place  with 
her  son.  She  remained  his  mother,  but  she  was  no 
longer  first.  The  other,  that  Peter  had  not  told  her 
about  Betty  at  once  and  had  left  it  for  her  to  find  out, 
as  the  others  did.  And  this  hurt  badly.  He  had  al- 
ways been  in  the  habit  of  telling  her  everything, — 
first  at  her  knee,  then  as  he  stood  on  a  level  with  her, 
and  finally  when  he  looked  down  upon  her  from  his 
great  height.  Every  one  of  his  numerous  letters  writ- 
ten while  he  was  so  far  away  from  home  contained  the 
outpourings  of  his  soul  —  his  troubles,  difficulties,  tri- 
umphs, wonderings  and  short  incoherent  cries  for 
help.  As  Kenyon  said,  she  had  only  to  look  at  him 
once  when  he  marched  into  the  Old  Inn  at  Woodstock 
with  Betty  to  know  that  she  had  lost  him.  She  waited 
for  him  that  afternoon  to  tell  her, —  but  he  never 
spoke.  Even  as  he  put  her  into  the  train  she  hoped 
that  he  would  remember,  but  he  didn't.  That  wasn't 


74          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

like  her  Peter,  she  told  herself  again  and  again.  What 
was  she  to  think  but  that  it  only  needed  one  short  week 
and  a  very  pretty  face  to  make  him  forget  all  the  long 
years  of  her  love  and  tenderness.  It  was  very,  very 
hard. 

It  is  true  that  for  the  remainder  of  their  holiday, 
during  which,  with  her  husband,  Graham,  Belle,  and 
Betty,  Mrs.  Guthrie  went  from  one  charming  place  to 
another,  seeing  shrines  and  looking  down  from  fa- 
mous heights  on  garden-like  valleys  of  English  coun- 
try, Peter's  letters  came  as  regularly  as  usual.  They 
were  no  shorter  and  no  less  intimate;  and  in  the  first 
one  that  she  received,  the  day  after  leaving  Oxford, 
he  told  her  his  great  news, —  but  he  hadn't  spoken  of 
it  —  he  hadn't  come  to  her  at  once,  and  she  felt  with 
a  great  shock  of  pain  that  she  was  deposed.  Also  she 
was  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  the  same  posts  which 
brought  her  letters  brought  letters  to  Betty  —  and  she 
was  jealous. 

Uttering  no  word  of  complaint,  even  to  the  Doctor, 
little  Mrs.  Guthrie  nursed  her  sorrow  and  went  out  of 
her  way  to  be  very  nice  to  Betty.  Her  mother-in- 
stinct told  her  that  she  must  win  this  girl;  otherwise 
there  was  a  chance  that  she  might  in  the  future  see  very 
little  of  Peter.  In  all  this  she  had  one  small  triumph, 
of  which  she  made  the  most.  Her  letters  from  Peter 
contained  more  news  than  those  written  to  Betty,  and 
thus  she  was  able  to  score  a  little  over  the  girl.  With 
an  air  of  great  superiority,  very  natural  under  the  cir- 
cumstances, she  told  Betty  and  the  others  the  manner 
in  which  Peter  had  gone  down  from  Oxford;  of  the 


YOUTH  75 

dinner  that  was  given  to  him  by  the  American  Club, — 
a  great  evening,  during  which  he  was  presented  with  a 
silver  cigarette  box  covered  with  signatures, —  of  the 
farewell  luncheon  with  his  professors  and  the  delight- 
ful things  that  they  said  to  him  there ;  of  his  strenuous 
doings  at  Henley,  the  stern  training,  the  race  itself  in 
which  his  boat  was  beaten;  of  the  wild  night  on  the 
Vanderbilt  barge;  of  the  few  cheery  days  spent  in 
London  with  a  bunch  of  the  Rhodesmen;  and  finally 
his  preparations  for  his  visit  to  Thrapstone-Wynyates, 
in  Shropshire,  the  famous  old  Tudor  House  of  Ken- 
yon' s  father. 

Three  times  during  these  pleasant  weeks  Peter  ran 
down  to  see, —  not  her,  but  Betty,  and  went  out  with 
her  with  his  face  alight  and  then  hurried  back  to  his 
engagements,  having  given  her,  his  mother,  who  loved 
him  so,  several  hugs  and  a  few  incoherent  words.  It 
was  the  way  of  life,  youth  to  youth,  but  it  was  very 
hard. 

On  the  afternoon  of  the  fifth  of  August,  when  the 
party  crossed  the  gangplank  at  Southampton  to  go 
aboard  the  Olympic,  little  Mrs.  Guthrie  told  herself 
that  in  a  few  minutes  she  would  see  Peter's  great  form 
elbowing  through  the  crowd,  although  he  had  not  said 
that  he  would  be  there  to  say  good-bye.  She  almost 
hoped  that  something  might  prevent  him  from  being 
in  time,  because  she  knew  that  he  would  not  come  solely 
to  hold  her  in  his  arms,  but  for  another  reason.  Noth- 
ing, however,  did  prevent  him.  He  followed  them  al- 
most instantly  on  board ;  and  although  he  never  left  her 
side,  he  surreptitiously  held  Betty's  hand  all  the  time. 


76         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

A  smile  of  unusual  bitterness  crept  all  about  the 
little  woman's  heart.  It  was  very  hard.  He  was  her 
boy  —  her  son  —  her  first-born  and  the  apple  of  her 
eye.  She  had  come  up  for  the  first  time  to  one  of  the 
rudest  awakenings  that  a  mother  can  ever  know.  And 
presently  when  the  cry,  "  All  ashore  that's  going 
ashore !  "  went  up  and  Peter  put  both  his  big  arms 
about  her  and  said,  "  Good-bye,  mummie,  darling,  I 
shall  come  home  soon,"  she  broke  into  such  a  fit  of 
weeping  and  kissed  him  with  a  passion  so  great  that 
the  boy  was  startled  and  a  little  frightened.  There 
was  no  time  to  think  or  ask  questions.  There  was 
his  father's  hand  to  shake,  and  Graham's,  and  Belle 
to  kiss.  There  was  also  Betty,  and  she  was  suddenly 
hugged  before  them  all. 

As  the  big  liner  sent  out  its  raucous  note  of  de- 
parture and  moved  away  from  the  dock  the  little 
mother  was  unable  to  see  the  bare  head  of  her  boy 
above  the  heads  of  the  great  crowd.  Her  eyes  \vere 
blinded.  "  He  doesn't  understand,"  she  said  to  her- 
self. "  He  doesn't  understand." 

Poor  little  mother !     It  was  very  hard. 


XIII 

THE  cottage  on  the  borders  of  Lord  Shropshire's 

park  was  just  as  pretty  and  just  as  small  as  the  little 

lady  who  lived  there.     It   was   appropriately   called 

'The  Nest,"  although  there  was  no  male  bird  in  it 

and  it  was  devoid  of  young  ones;  but  Mrs.  Randolph 


YOUTH  77 

Lennox  was  so  like  a  bird,  with  her  trilly  soprano 
voice,  her  quick  dartings  here  and  there  and  the  pe- 
culiar way  she  had  of  getting  all  a-flutter  when  people 
called,  that  the  name  of  her  charming  little  place  — 
first  given  by  Kenyon  —  stuck,  and  was  generally  used. 

It  was  perched  up  on  high  ground  overlooking  the 
gardens  of  the  old  Tudor  House, —  those  wonderful 
Italian  gardens  in  which  Charles  II  had  dallied  with 
his  mistresses  on  his  return  from  his  long,  heart-break- 
ing and  hungry  exile.  It  was  tree-surrounded  and 
creepers  grew  up  its  old  walls  to  its  thickly  thatched 
roof.  For  many  years  it  had  been  occupied  by  the 
agent  of  the  estate,  until  —  so  it  was  said  —  it  was 
won  by  Mrs.  Lennox  from  the  present  Lord  Shrop- 
shire as  the  result  of  a  bet. 

No  one  had  ever  seen  Randolph  Lennox  and  many 
people  didn't  believe  that  he  was  anything  more  than 
a  myth;  but  the  little  woman  gave  herself  out  as  the 
widow  of  this  man  and  was  accepted  as  such.  Her 
income  was  small,  but  not  so  small  as  to  preclude  her 
from  playing  bridge  for  fairly  large  stakes,  dressing 
exquisitely,  riding  to  the  hounds  and  keeping  an  ex- 
tremely efficient  menage,  consisting  of  two  maid  serv- 
ants and  an  elderly  gardener.  It  enabled  her  also  to 
spend  May  and  June  in  London  yearly  at  a  little  hotel 
in  Half  Moon  Street,  Piccadilly,  from  which  utterly 
correct  little  house  she  was  taken  nightly  to  dinner 
and  to  the  theatre  by  one  or  other  of  the  numerous 
young  men  who  formed  her  entourage.  Never  taken 
actually  into  the  heart  of  London  society,  she  man- 
aged with  quiet  skill  to  attach  herself  to  its  rather 


78         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

long  limbs,  and  her  name  was  frequently  to  be  found 
in  the  columns  of  society  papers  as  having  been  seen 
in  a  creation  by  Paquin  or  Macinka  at  Ranalagh  or 
Hurlingham,  the  opera,  or  lunching  at  the  Ritz. 

At  one  time  the  tongue  of  rumor  had  been  very 
busy  about  Mrs.  Randolph  Lennox, — "  Baby  "  Len- 
nox as  she  was  commonly  called.  It  was  said  that  she 
had  been  lifted  out  of  the  chorus  of  the  Gaiety  at  the 
age  of  nineteen  by  His  Serene  Highness,  the  Prince 
of  Booch-Kehah;  that  she  had  passed  under  the  con- 
trol of  Captain  Harry  Waterloo,  and  eventually,  be- 
fore disappearing  for  a  time,  figured  in  the  Divorce 
Court  as  a  corespondent.  The  tongue  of  rumor  is, 
however,  in  the  mouth  of  Ananias,  and  as  Baby  Len- 
nox never  spoke  of  herself  except,  a  little  sadly,  as  a 
woman  whose  brief  married  life  was  an  unfortunate 
memory,  her  past  remained  a  mystery  and  people  were 
obliged  to  accept  her  for  her  present  and  her  future. 
She  was  so  small  —  so  golden-haired  —  so  large  eyed 
—  so  fresh  and  young  and  dainty  —  so  consistently 
charming  and  birdlike  —  that  she  was  the  Mecca  of 
very  young  men.  With  the  beautiful  trustfulness  of 
the  male  young  they  believed  in  her,  and  over  and  over 
again  she  could  have  changed  her  name  to  others  which 
were  equally  euphonious  and  which,  unlike  her  own, 
could  be  discovered  in  the  Red  Book.  But  as  there 
was  no  money  attached  to  them  she  continued  to  re- 
main a  young  and  interesting  widow  and  to  live  in  the 
little  cottage  on  the  hill  and  to  pop  in  and  out  of  the 
Shropshire  house  as  the  most  popular  member  of  its 
kaleidoscopic  parties. 


YOUTH  79 

Whether  there  was  any  truth  in  the  story  that  the 
present  Lord  Shropshire  was  related  to  her  in  a  fa- 
therly way  no  one  will  ever  know,  except  perhaps 
Nicholas  Kenyon,  who  in  his  treatment  of  her  was 
uncharacteristically  brotherly.  These  two,  at  any 
rate,  had  no  secrets  from  each  other  and  both  regarded 
life  from  the  same  peculiar  angle.  As  parasites  they 
had  everything  in  common  and  they  assisted  each  other 
and  played  into  each  other's  hands  with  a  loyalty  that 
was  praiseworthy  even  under  these  circumstances. 

Nicholas  Kenyon's  mother  —  a  very  large,  hand- 
some woman  with  brilliant  teeth  and  amazing  good- 
nature, who,  even  when  in  the  best  of  health,  never 
finished  dressing  till  four  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  and 
then  never  put  much  on  —  was  undergoing  a  rest-cure 
in  the  west  wing  of  Thrapstone-Wynyates  when  the 
boys  arrived  for  the  shooting.  For  nearly  a  year  she 
had  been  playing  auction  every  night  until  the  very 
small  hours  and  had,  while  in  a  nervous  condition, 
stumbled  across  an  emotional  pamphlet  written  by  a 
Welsh  revivalist,  which  sent  her  straight  to  bed.  She 
was  really  greatly  shaken  by  it  and  perhaps  a  little  bit 
frightened.  It  did  not  mince  words  about  the  future 
of  women  of  her  type,  and  she  was  shocked.  Heaven 
seemed  to  her  to  be  a  place  into  which  she  had  the 
same  inherited  right  to  walk  as  the  Royal  Enclosure 
at  Ascot;  but  this  vehement  little  book  put  a  widely 
different  point  of  view  before  her.  Therefore  it  hap- 
pened that  the  first  woman  to  whom  Peter  was  intro- 
duced was  the  little  widow,  "  Baby  "  Lennox,  who  was 
acting  as  hostess. 


8o         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Two  evenings  before  she  met  Peter  she  had  received 
a  letter  from  Kenyon,  which  ran  as  follows : 

"  Carlton  Hotel, 
"Dear  Old  Girl: 

"  I  shall  turn  up  at  home  on  Thursday  in  time  for  tea. 
I  hear  that  mother  is  enjoying  herself  in  the  throes  of 
some  very  pleasant  imaginary  complaint  of  sorts  and  has 
retired  to  the  solitude  of  the  west  wing.  After  a  busy 
season  she  no  doubt  wishes  to  read  Wells'  new  novel  of 
socialism  and  seduction  and  the  latest  Masefield  poems, 
which  always  remind  me  of  the  ramblings  of  rum-soaked 
sailors  in  a  Portsmouth  pub.  I,  for  one,  shall  miss  her 
florid  and  inaccurate  presence  and  the  deliciously  flagrant 
way  in  which  she  cheats  at  Bridge ;  but  if  father  has  gath- 
ered round  him  an  August  house-party  on  his  usual  lines, 
I  look  forward  to  a  cheery  time, —  dog  eating  dog,  if  I 
may  put  it  like  that.  I  am  bringing  with  me  the  man 
with  whom  I  have  shared  rooms  at  Oxford, —  Peter 
Guthrie.  He's  the  American  of  whom  I  have  spoken  to 
you  before.  I  am  especially  anxious  for  him  to  meet 
you,  because,  while  under  the  hypnotic  influence  of  Ox- 
ford in  all  the  beauty  of  late  spring,  he  has  been  fool 
enough  to  get  himself  engaged.  Now,  not  only  is  Guthrie 
very  useful  to  me,  having  a  wealthy  father  and  being 
himself  a  generous  soul,  but  I  am  going  to  New  York 
with  him  in  October  to  see  if  that  city  can  be  made  to  ren- 
der up  some  of  its  unlimited  dollars,  and  I  don't  want  him 
to  be  hanging,  booby-eyed,  at  the  heels  of  a  girl  until  such 
time  as  I  have  found  my  feet.  You  have  a  wonderful 
way  with  the  very  young  and  unsophisticated  and  I  shall 
really  be  enormously  obliged  if  you  will  work  your  never- 
failing  wiles  on  my  most  useful  friend  and  draw  his  at 
present  infatuated  mind  away  from  the  nice,  harmless 


YOUTH  81 

little  girl  who  has  just  sailed.  Fasten  on  him,  my  dear, 
and  make  him  attach  himself  to  you  for  the  remainder  of 
our  holiday.  Go  as  far  as  you  dare  or  care, —  the  farther 
the  better  for  my  sake  and  eventually  for  his  own.  He  is 
one  of  those  admirable,  simple,  big,  virgin  men  to  whom 
women  are  a  wonderful  mystery.  At  present  he  has  re- 
fused even  to  look  through  a  glass,  darkly,  at  that  pleasant 
and  compensating  side  of  life,  and  he  needs  to  be  brought 
down  from  his  self-made  pedestal.  It  will  do  him  good 
and  me  a  service.  Honestly,  I  find  it  more  than  a  little 
trying  to  be  in  such  close  association  with  an  Archangel. 
Turn  your  innocent  blue  eyes  on  him,  Baby  dear,  and 
teach  him  things  and,  above  all,  get  him  out  of  this  silly, 
sentimental  tangle  of  his.  Incidentally,  he  has  money 
and  can  procure  more  and  I  feel  sure  that  you  will  not 
find  him  a  waste  of  your  good  efforts.  He  is  a  splendid 
specimen  of  what  my  particular  Don  was  wont  to  call 
'  young  manhood,'  and  when  he  plays  ragtime  he  puts 
the  Savoy,  or,  for  the  matter  of  that,  any  other  English 
orchestra  into  a  little  round  hole. 

"  Yours  ever, 

"  N.  K." 

Quite  unconscious  of  this  scheme,  Peter  fell  into  the 
light-heartedness  of  this  beautiful  old  house  with  his 
usual  gusto.  To  his  unsuspicious  eyes  Baby  Lennox 
was  quite  the  most  charming  woman  he  had  ever  met. 

He  was  delighted,  a  little  surprised  and  even  a  little 
jealous  at  the  relations  which  existed  between  Kenyon 
and  his  father.  He  was  quick  to  notice  that  they 
treated  each  other  more  like  pals  or  brothers,  than 
father  and  son,  were  entirely  open  and  frank  with 
each  other,  walked  about  arm  in  arm,  played  tennis 


82         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

and  billiards  together  and  often  spent  hours  in  each 
other's  society,  laughing  and  talking.  He  noticed,  too, 
that  Kenyon  always  called  his  father  "  Tops,"  a  name 
which  had  grown  into  daily  use  from  the  time  when, 
as  a  tiny  lad  just  able  to  talk,  the  things  that  most 
caught  his  fancy  were  Lord  Shropshire's  riding-boots, 
in  which  he  seemed  to  live,  being  mostly  on  horseback. 
"  Nicko  "  was  what  his  father  called  Kenyon, —  that 
and  old  man  or  old  boy.  He  wished  most  deeply  that 
he  and  his  own  father  were  on  such  good  terms. 

If  Peter  had  heard  the  sort  of  things  these  two 
talked  about  and  confided  to  each  other,  his  surprise 
would  have  elaborated  into  amazement.  The  elder 
man  took  infinite  pleasure  in  telling  the  one  who  was 
so  complete  a  chip  off  the  same  block  the  most  minute 
details  of  his  love  affairs  during  the  time  that  he  was 
at  Sandhurst  for  his  army  training,  while  he  was  in  a 
crack  Cavalry  regiment  and  while  he  knocked  about 
London  and  Paris  and  Vienna  before  and  after  his 
marriage.  Also  he  revelled  in  relating  his  racing  and 
gambling  experiences,  describing  the  more  shady  epi- 
sodes with  witty  phrases  and  a  touch  of  satire  that  was 
highly  entertaining  to  the  younger  man.  They  both 
agreed,  with  a  paradoxical  sort  of  honesty,  deliberately 
and  inherently,  that  they  were  not  straight  and  ac- 
cepted each  other  as  such,  and  the  father  used  fre- 
quently to  speculate  from  which  of  his  dull,  responsible 
and  worthy  ancestors  he  acquired  the  tendency.  It 
was  certainly  not  from  the  late  Lord  Shropshire, 
whose  brilliant  work  as  a  Cabinet  Minister  in  several 
Governments  and  as  one  of  the  most  valued  advisers 


YOUTH  83 

of  Queen  Victoria  had  placed  his  name  permanently 
in  the  annals  of  his  country.  "  We  get  it  from  one  of 
the  women  of  the  family,  I  suspect,  Nicko,"  he  had  a 
way  of  saying,  after  a  more  than  usually  excellent  din- 
ner. "  A  dear,  pretty  creature  who  lived  a  double  life 
with  delightful  finesse  —  the  great  lady  and  the  hu- 
man woman  by  turns.  What  d'you  think,  old  boy? 
At  any  rate,  you  and  I  make  no  pretences  and,  'pon 
my  soul!  I  don't  know  which  of  us  is  the  better  ex- 
ponent in  the  delicate  and  difficult  art  of  sleight  of 
hand.  I  wish  I  were  going  to  America  with  you.  I 
fancy  that  we  should  make  in  double  harness  enough 
to  enable  us  to  retire  from  the  game  and  live  like  little 
gentlemen.  As  it  is,  you'll  do  very  well,  I've  no  doubt. 
From  what  I  hear,  the  country  reeks  with  wealthy 
young  men  waiting  to  be  touched  by  an  expert  such  as 
you  are.  Do  some  good  work,  old  fellow,  and  when 
you  come  back  you  shall  lend  me  a  portion  of  your 
earnings,  eh  ?  " 

They  were  a  strange  couple,  these  two,  capable,  out- 
wardly charming  and  cut  out  for  a  very  different  way 
of  life  but  for  the  regrettable  possession  of  a  kink 
which  caused  them  to  become  harpies  and  turn  the 
weaknesses  of  unsuspicion  of  human  nature  to  their 
own  advantage.  Some  psychologists  might  have  gone 
out  of  their  way  to  find  excuses  for  these  men  and 
endeavor  to  prove  that  they  would  both  have  run 
straight  but  for  the  fact  that  they  were  always  pushed 
for  money.  They  would,  however,  have  been  wrong. 
Just  as  some  men  are  born  orators,  some  with  me- 
chanical and  creative  genius  and  some  with  the  gift  of 


84          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

leadership,  these  two  men  were  born  crooked,  and  un- 
der no  conditions,  even  the  most  favorable,  could  they 
have  played  any  game  according  to  the  rules. 

The  men  of  the  party  were  all  excellent  sportsmen 
and  good  fellows,  and  the  women  more  than  usually 
delightful  representatives  of  English  society.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  the  men  were  all, —  like  Kenyon's  fa- 
ther,—  living  on  their  wits  and  just  avoiding  criminal 
prosecution  by  the  eighth  of  an  inch.  They  called 
themselves  racing  men,  which,  translated  into  cold 
English,  means  that  they  were  people  of  no  ostensible 
means  of  livelihood,  who  attended  every  race  meeting 
and  backed  horses  on  credit,  taking  their  winnings  and 
owing  their  losses  until  chased  by  crook  solicitors. 
They  all  bore  names  well  known  in  English  history. 
They  had  all  passed  through  the  best  schools  and  either 
Oxford,  Cambridge  or  Sandhurst.  One  or  two  of 
them  were  still  in  the  army.  One  had  been  requested 
to  resign  from  the  navy,  the  King  having  no  further 
use  for  his  services,  and  one  was  a  Member  of  Parlia- 
ment, having  previously  been  hammered  in  the  other 
house, —  that  is  to  say  the  Stock  Exchange.  The 
women  of  the  party  were  either  wives  of  these  men 
or  not,  as  the  case  may  be.  At  any  rate  they  were 
good  to  look  at,  amusing  to  talk  to,  and  apparently 
without  a  care  in  the  world.  And  if  Lord  Shrop- 
shire, in  welcoming  Peter  to  his  famous  house,  had 
said,  like  the  spider  to  the  fly,  "  Come  into  my  parlor 
so  that  whatever  you  have  about  you  may  be  sucked 
dry  by  us,"  he  would  have  been  strictly  truthful.  Sev- 
eral other  such  men  as  Peter  had  gone  into  that  web 


YOUTH  85 

sound  and  whole,  but  they  had  come  out  again  with 
many  things  to  regret  and  forget. 

Who  could  say  whether  Peter  would  escape? 


XIV 

PETER  had,  as  he  duly  reported  to  his  mother  and  to 
Betty,  a  corking  time  at  Thrapstone-Wynyates. 

Although  an  open-air  man,  an  athlete,  whose  read- 
ing had  always  been  confined  to  those  books  only  that 
were  necessary  to  his  work, —  dry  law  books  for  the 
most  part, —  Peter  was  far  from  being  insensible  to  the 
mellow  beauty  of  the  house,  and  his  imagination,  un- 
cultivated so  far  as  any  training  in  art  or  architecture 
went,  was  subconsciously  stirred  by  the  knowledge 
that  its  floors  and  stone  walks  and  galleries  were  worn 
by  the  feet  of  a  long  line  of  men  and  women  whose 
loves  and  passions  and  hatreds  had  been  worked  out 
there  and  whose  ghostly  forms  in  all  the  picturesque 
trappings  of  several  centuries  haunted  its  echoing  Hall 
and  looked  down  from  its  walls,  from  their  places  in 
gold  frames,  upon  its  present  occupants. 

The  atmosphere  of  Oxford,  and  especially  of  his 
own  college,  had  often  spun  his  thoughts  from  rowing 
and  other  strenuous,  splendid,  vital  things,  to  the  great 
silent  army  of  dead  men  whose  shouts  had  rung 
through  the  quad  and  whose  rushing  feet  had  gone 
under  the  old  gate.  But  this  house,  standing  bravely 
and  with  an  indescribable  sense  of  responsibility  as 
one  of  the  few  rear-guards  of  those  great  days  of 


86         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

chivalry  and  gallant  fighting  for  heroic  causes,  moved 
him  differently.  Here  women  had  been  and  their  per- 
fume seemed  to  hang  to  the  tapestries,  and  the  influ- 
ence of  their  hands  that  could  no  longer  touch  was 
everywhere  apparent.  Often  Peter  drew  up  short,  on 
his  way  up  the  wide  staircase,  to  listen  for  the  click 
of  high  heels,  the  tinkle  of  a  spinet  and  the  rattle  of 
dice.  Everywhere  he  went  he  had  a  queer  but  not 
unpleasant  sense  of  never  being  alone,  just  as  most 
men  have  who  walk  along  the  cloisters  of  a  cathedral 
whose  vast  array  of  empty  prie-dieus  have  felt  the 
knees  of  many  generations  and  in  whose  lofty  roof 
there  is  collected  the  voices  of  an  unnumberable  choir. 

Up  early  enough  to  find  the  dew  still  wet  on  flowers 
and  turf  he  enjoyed  a  swim  every  morning  in  the 
Italian  bathing  pool  beneath  the  Cedar  trees  with  Baby 
Lennox.  Then  he  either  went  for  a  gallop,  before 
breakfast,  on  one  of  Lord  Shropshire's  ponies  —  again 
with  Baby  Lennox  —  or  had  a  round  of  golf  with  her 
on  the  workmanlike  nine-hole  course  which  had  been 
laid  out  in  the  park.  She  played  a  neat  game,  driving 
straight,  approaching  deftly  and  putting  like  a  book, — 
frequently  beating  him. 

The  picture  of  this  very  pretty  little  person  as  she 
stood  on  the  edge  of  the  bathing  pool  that  first  morn- 
ing was,  as  she  intended  it  to  be,  indescribably  attrac- 
tive. She  came  from  her  room  in  a  white  kimono 
worked  with  the  beautiful  designs  which  only  the 
Chinese  can  achieve.  Her  golden  hair  was  closely 
covered  by  a  tight-fitting  bathing  cap  of  geranium  red, 
most  becoming  to  her  white  skin.  "  Mr.  Peter!  "  she 


YOUTH  87 

called  out.  "  I  can't  swim  a  bit,  so  you  must  look 
after  me  like  —  like  a  brother."  And  then,  as  though 
to  show  how  silly  that  word  was,  she  flung  off  the 
wrap  and  stood,  all  slim  and  sweet,  in  blue  silk  tights 
cut  low  at  the  neck  and  high  above  her  little  round 
white  knees.  Peter  thought,  with  a  kind  of  boyish 
gasp,  that  she  looked  like  a  most  alluring  drawing  on 
the  cover  of  a  magazine.  With  an  irresistible  simplic- 
ity and  utter  lack  of  self-consciousness  she  stood,  bal- 
anced on  the  edge  of  the  pool,  with  the  sun  embracing 
her,  in  a  diving  attitude,  in  no  hurry  to  take  her  dip. 
And  when  Peter,  suddenly  seized  with  the  notion  that 
he  might  be  looking  at  her  too  intently,  dived  in,  she 
gave  a  little  cry  of  joy  and  dismay  and  jumped  in  after 
him.  "  You  must  hold  me,  you  must  hold  me,  or  I 
shall  go  under ! "  she  cried,  and  he  swam  with  her  to 
the  steps.  In  reality  she  swam  like  a  frog,  but  her 
beautiful  assumption  of  inability  and  her  pluck  in 
jumping  into  deep  water  again  and  again  to  be  taken 
possession  of  by  him,  rilled  him  with  admiration  at  her 
courage.  With  her  tights  wet  and  clinging  and  the 
water  glistening  on  her  white  flesh  she  assured  herself 
that  she  deserved  admiration,  having  carefully  calcu- 
lated her  effect.  Practice  makes  perfect,  and  the  very 
young  are  always  alike. 

The  first  morning  on  which  she  appeared  in  riding 
kit  she  again  made  a  charming  picture.  She  always 
rode  astride,  but  few  women  would  have  ventured  to 
wear  such  thin  and  such  close-fitting  white  breeches. 
Her  coat,  cut  like  a  man's,  was  of  white  drill.  Her 
stock  was  white  and  her  hat,  with  a  wide  flat  brim  was 


88         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

of  white  straw,  but  her  boots  were  as  black  and  shiny 
as  the  back  of  a  crow.  "  Your  hand,  Mr.  Peter,"  she 
said,  raising  her  little  foot  for  the  spring, —  it  was 
"  Mr.  Peter  "  still, — "  what  a  gorgeous  morning  for 
a  gallop."  And  for  a  moment  she  leaned  warmly 
against  his  shoulder.  Yes,  she  was  quite  pleased  with 
the  effect.  Peter's  face  was  flushed  as  they  started 
off  together. 

When  they  golfed  she  had  a  delightful  way  of  mak- 
ing her  conversation  from  green  to  green  into  a  sort 
of  serial.  With  her  head  hatless,  her  short  Irish 
homespun  skirt  displaying  much  blue  stocking  which 
exactly  matched  her  silk  sweater  and  her  large  be- 
fringed eyes,  she  made  a  fascinating  opponent  and 
companion.  "  No  wonder  you  loved  Oxford  and  all 
that  it  gave  you.  Quite  a  little  tee,  please.  Thanks. 
To  a  man  with  any  imagination  — "  A  settle,  a  swing, 
a  nice  straight  ball  and  silence  while  Peter  beat  his 
ball  pressing  for  all  he  was  worth;  the  picking  up  of 
the  two  bags  and  on  side  by  side.  "  A  man  witlv  any 
imagination  must  feel  the  beauty  and  underlying  mean- 
ing of  that  inspiring  atmosphere, —  as  of  course  you 
did.  You,  I  can  see,  are  highly  susceptible  to  every- 
thing that  is  beautiful.  You,  I  think,  of  all  men,  you 
who  have  managed  to  remain, —  I'm  sure  I  don't  know 
how !  —  so  unspoiled,  will  always  remember  and  feel 
the  influence  of  your  college.  A  cleek,  I  think,  don't 
you?  No?  A  brassie?  Just  as  you  say."  And  so 
she  would  continue  chatting  merrily  away  all  round, 
but  always  keen  on  her  game  and  doing  her  best  to  do 
it  credit,  letting  out  nice  little  bits  of  flattery  with  so 


YOUTH  89 

naive  an  air  and  with  such  frankly  appreciative  glances, 
that  poor  old  Peter's  vanity,  hitherto  absolutely  dor- 
mant, began  to  bud,  like  new  leaves  in  April. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  Peter  was  a  rowing 
man.  Always,  except  when  out  with  the  guns,  he  was 
with  Baby  Lennox.  They  were  inseparable  from  the 
first  day  of  his  visit.  Even  in  the  evening  they  hunted 
in  couples,  because  she  was  sick  of  Bridge,  she  said, 
and  he  gave  out  that  he  knew  nothing  at  all  about  any 
card  games  and  had  no  desire  to  learn.  After  being 
frequently  pressed  to  cut  in  by  Courthope,  Pulsford, 
Fountain  and  the  other  men  who  could  not  bear  to 
see  him  with  an  unscathed  cheque-book,  and  tempted 
again  and  again  by  their  well-groomed  and  delightfully 
friendly  wives  to  try  a  hand,  Peter  was  left  alone. 
They  were  annoyed  and  irritated  but  they  found  that 
when  Peter  said  "  No  "  he  didn't  mean  "  Yes,"  like 
so  many  of  the  other  young  men  whose  weakness 
formed  the  greater  part  of  these  people's  income ;  and 
so  they  very  quickly  gave  him  up  to  Baby  Lennox, 
were  obliged  to  be  satisfied  with  his  jovial  piano-play- 
ing and  make  up  for  lost  time  with  the  inevitable  mem- 
bers of  the  nouveau  riches  who  lived  near  by  and  were 
only  too  glad  to  pay  for  the  privilege  of  dining  at 
Thrapstone-Wynyates  in  the  odour  of  titles. 

The  nights  being  warm  and  windless,  Peter  sat  out 
on  the  moon-bathed  terrace  with  Baby  Lennox  listen- 
ing to  her  girlish  prattle  and  thinking  how  particularly 
charming  she  looked  with  the  soft  light  on  her  golden 
hair  and  white  arms  and  dainty  foot.  Sometimes, 
suddenly,  her  merry  words  would  give  place  to  sad 


90         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ones,  and  Peter's  simple,  honest  heart  would  be  touched 
by  her  artistic  and  mythical  glimpses  of  the  unhappy 
side  of  her  life. 

"Oh,  Peter,  Peter!"  she  said  one  night,  uncon- 
sciously showing  almost  a  yard  of  leg  in  a  black  lace 
stocking  patterned  with  butterflies.  "  I  wish,  oh,  how 
I  wish  that  I'd  been  born  like  you,  under  a  lucky  star ! 
I've  always  been  in  a  smart  and  rather  careless  set  and 
I've  never  really  had  time  to  see  visions  and  walk  in 
the  garden  of  my  soul."  She  spoke  in  capital  letters. 
"  If  I'd  met  you  when  I  was  a  little  young  thing  you 
might  have  become  my  gardener  to  pluck  the  weeds 
out  of  my  paths,  and  train  the  flowers  of  my  mind. 
You  might  have  planted  seeds  so  sweet  that  in  my  best 
and  most  devout  hours  their  blooms  would  have  filled 
my  thoughts  with  scent.  Oh  dear  me,  the  might  have 
beens, —  how  sad  they  are !  But,  in  one  thing  at  least 
I  can  take  joy, —  I'm  all  the  better  for  knowing  you, 
dear  big  Peter." 

But  these  graver  interludes  never  lasted  long. 
Mrs.  Lennox  was  far  too  clever  for  that.  She  would 
break  the  monotony  of  conversation  by  walking  with 
her  little  hand  on  the  boy's  strong  arm,  or  by  dancing 
with  him  to  the  music  of  a  gramophone  placed  in  the 
open  window  of  the  morning  room.  How  close  she 
clung  to  him  then  and  how  sweet  she  was  to  hold ! 

And  then,  she  would  say,  with  a  wonderful  throb 
in  her  voice.  "Oh,  Peter,  Peter!  Isn't  life  wonder- 
ful—  isn't  it  just  the  most  wonderful  and  thrilling 
thing  that  is  given  to  us  ?  Listen  to  the  stars  —  there's 
love  in  their  song !  Listen  to  the  nightingale  —  love, 


YOUTH  91 

all  love !  Listen  to  the  whisper  of  the  breeze !  Can't 
you  hear  it  tell  us  to  love  and  touch  and  taste  all  the 
sweets  that  are  given  us  to  enjoy?  Oh,  Peter,  Peter! 
Listen,  listen, —  and  live !  " 

In  her  picturesque  and  slangy  way  she  announced 
to  Kenyon,  as  soon  as  three  days  after  the  commence- 
ment of  the  house-party,  that  she  "  had  got  Peter  well 
hooked."  It  was  not,  however,  an  accurate  statement. 
It  is  true  that  Peter's  vanity  had  been  appealed  to. 
Whose  wouldn't  have  been?  This  attractive  young 
thing  was  hostess.  She  was  far  and  away  prettier, 
younger,  more  alluring  and  more  complex  than  any 
other  woman  in  the  party.  And  yet  she  had  made  a 
favorite  of  Peter  at  once  and  showed  a  frank  pleasure 
in  being  with  him  at  all  possible  times.  He  had  hardly 
spoken  for  longer  than  an  hour  with  her  before  she  had 
said,  in  the  middle  of  his  description  of  the  Henley 
week,  "  I  must  call  you  Mr.  Peter,  I  must.  May  I  ?  " 
She  sent  him  little  notes,  too,  charming,  spontaneous 
little  notes,  to  say  "  Good-night,"  and  how  greatly  she 
had  enjoyed  the  evening,  or  the  swim,  or  the  round  of 
golf,  beginning  "Dear  Big  Man"  and  ending, —  at 
first  without  a  signature,  and  eventually  with  "  Baby." 
At  the  beginning  they  were  brought  in  by  the  man,  or 
placed  on  the  dressing-table  against  a  bowl  of  flowers. 
Then  they  were  thrust  under  his  door  by  her  after  he 
had  gone  up  to  his  room,  or  thrown  through  his  open 
window  from  the  narrow  balcony  that  ran  round  the 
house.  Her  room  was  next  to  his.  She  had  seen  to 
that.  In  a  hundred  unexpected  and  appealing  ways 
she  had  set  out  to  prove  to  him  that  they  were  indeed, 


92          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

as  she  had  said  they  were,  "  very,  very  close  friends." 
Now,  Peter  had  never  been  a  woman's  man.  To  him 
women  and  their  ways  were  new  and  wonderful.  He 
suspected  nothing.  Why  should  he?  He  accepted 
Mrs.  Randolph  Lennox  on  her  face  value,  which  was 
priceless,  as  so  many  other  excellent  and  unsophisti- 
cated young  men  had  done.  He  believed  in  her  and 
her  stories  and  was  very  sorry  that  she  had  been  un- 
happy. He  believed  that  she  was  sincere  and  good 
and  clean  and  that  she  liked  him  and  was  his  friend. 

Kenyon,  who  watched  all  this,  called  Peter  an  easy 
mark.  He  was.  What  else  could  he  be  in  the  expert 
and  cunning  hands  of  such  a  woman? 

As  for  Mrs.  Lennox,  her  performance, —  it  was 
rather  in  the  nature  of  a  performance, —  was  all  the 
more  brilliant  and  effective  because  Peter  appealed  to 
her  more  than  any  man  she  had  ever  met.  His  height 
and  strength  and  squareness,  his  fearless  honesty,  his 
unself -conscious  pride  and  boyish  love  of  life, —  she 
liked  them  all.  She  liked  his  clean-cut  healthy  face 
and  thick  hair  and  amazing  laugh.  But,  above  every- 
thing, she  liked  him  for  being  untilled  soil,  virgin 
earth.  It  was  this  that  piqued  her  seriously  and  set 
alight  in  her  a  desire  which  grew  and  grew,  to  test  her 
charms  upon  him,  to  taste  him,  to  stir  him  into  a  first 
great  passion.  And  this  was  the  real  reason  that  she 
gave  him  so  much  of  her  time  and  company.  The 
gratification  of  this  desire  was  the  thing  for  which  she 
was  working,  upon  which  she  had  set  her  mind.  Hers 
was  not  a  record  of  failures.  Peter  stood  a  very  poor 
chance  of  getting  out  whole. 


YOUTH  93 

XV 

NICHOLAS  KEN  YON  has  promised  himself  that,  one 
of  these  days,  when  abject  poverty  forces  him  to  work, 
he  will  write  a  whole  book  about  Peter  and  Baby  Len- 
nox, and  call  it  "  Another  Temptation  of  St.  An- 
thony." 

Not  only  did  Kenyon  watch  this,  to  him,  rather 
extraordinary  incident,  with  keen  interest,  but  so  also 
did  the  members  of  his  father's  house-party,  who  came 
to  regard  Peter  as  a  kind  of  freak.  They  all  knew, — 
because  they  were  all  psychologists, —  that  Mrs.  Len- 
nox was  badly  smitten;  as  they  put  it,  on  this  young 
American.  They  all  knew, —  because  one  of  the 
women  made  it  her  business  to  spy, —  that  their  tem- 
porary hostess  was  going  through  all  the  tricks  of  her 
trade  to  seduce  this  unconscious  boy. 

The  incident  provided  Lord  Shropshire  and  his 
friends  with  endless  amusement,  and  bets  were  made 
as  to  how  long  Peter  would  hold  out.  Every  morn- 
ing something  new  was  reported  to  them  by  the  lady 
who  had  appointed  herself  to  watch.  One  day  it  was 
that  Baby  had  taken  Peter  to  see  her  cottage  after 
dinner  and  had  had  a  little  fainting  fit  in  her  bedroom 
while  showing  him  the  view  from  the  window.  An- 
other that  she  had  twisted  her  ankle  on  the  eighth  hole 
and  had  been  obliged  to  ask  to  be  carried  back  to  the 
house.  There  was,  however,  no  evidence,  not  even  of 
a  circumstantial  nature,  to  prove  that  Baby  had  suc- 
ceeded. It  was  presently  agreed  that  either  Peter  was 
a  fool  or  an  angel. 


94          THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

There  was  one  incident,  however,  which  escaped  un- 
noticed,—  one  of  which  even  Kenyon  knew  nothing. 
It  took  place  three  nights  before  the  party  broke  up. 

After  a  gorgeous  day  of  hard  exercise  and  splendid 
fresh  air,  an  hour  at  the  piano  after  dinner  and  his 
usual  talk  to  Baby  under  the  moon,  Peter  went  up  to 
bed  at  eleven  o'clock.  He  was  very  sleepy  and  meant 
to  be  up  earlier  than  ever  in  the  morning.  He  didn't 
say  good-night  to  Kenyon  or  his  satirical  father. 
They  were,  like  the  others,  very  seriously  at  work 
making  what  money  they  could.  There  had  been  a 
fairly  large  dinner-party  drawn  from  the  surrounding 
houses,  and  there  were  eight  bridge  tables  occupied 
in  the  large  drawing-room.  He  left  Mrs.  Lennox  in 
the  hall  looking  more  delicious  than  ever  and  went  up 
to  his  room  to  smoke  a  final  pipe  and  look  over  an 
illustrated  paper  before  turning  in. 

His  room  was  large  and  square  and  wainscotted, 
with  dull  grilled  ceiling,  and  an  oak  floor  so  old  that 
here  and  there  it  slanted  badly.  His  bed  was  a  four- 
poster,  deeply  carved  at  the  back  with  the  Kenyon 
arms,  the  motto  underneath  rather  sarcastically  being 
"  For  God  and  Honour."  In  front  of  the  fireplace, 
with  its  sprawling  iron  dogs  and  oak  setting,  there  was 
a  long,  narrow  sofa  filled  with  cushions,  and  at  its  side 
a  small  writing-table  on  which  stood  two  tall  silver 
candlesticks.  These  gave  the  room  its  only  light  and 
added  to  the  Rembrandtesque  atmosphere  of  it.  It 
was  a  room  which  reeked  with  history  and  episodes  of 
historical  romance,  love  and  sudden  death.  The  win- 
dows which  led  to  the  balcony  were  open  and  the  warm 


YOUTH  95 

air  of  a  wonderful  night  puffed  in,  causing  the  candle 
flames  to  move  with  a  gentle  rhythmic  dignity  to  and 
fro. 

Peter  read  and  smoked  for  half  an  hour  in  his  dress- 
ing-gown, while  Quixotic  moths  flung  themselves  pas- 
sionately into  the  candle-light  one  after  another  to  die 
for  some  unexplainable  ideal.  From  the  drawing- 
room  below  a  woman's  throbbing  voice  drifted  up, 
singing  an  Indian  love  song,  and  when  it  ceased  the 
whole  night  was  set  a  quiver  by  a  nightingale's  out- 
burst of  appeal.  These  things,  and  the  silver  wonder 
of  the  moon  and  stars,  the  touch  of  Mrs.  Lennox's 
soft  hand  on  his  lips  and  the  feeling  and  almost  psychic 
undercurrent  of  strange  emotion  in  that  room  in  which 
so  much  had  taken  place,  all  stirred  and  thrilled  the 
boy  and  sent  his  blood  racing  in  his  veins. 

He  stayed  up  longer  than  he  intended,  listening  and 
wondering  and  wishing,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life, 
that  he  had  read  poetry,  so  that  he  could  fit  some  im- 
mortal lines  to  his  mood  and  his  surroundings.  It  was 
this,  to  him,  curious  thought  which  set  him  laughing 
and  broke  some  of  the  spell.  "  Gee !  "  he  said  to  him- 
self, "  can  you  see  me  spouting  Shakespeare  or  mouth- 
ing Byron  ?  "  He  shied  his  dressing-gown  into  the 
sofa,  put  both  flames  out  with  one  huge  blow  and 
leaped  into  bed. 

Almost  instantly  he  heard  his  name  urgently  called. 
He  sat  up.  Was  he  dreaming?  Who  should  call  at 
that  time  of  night  ?  Could  it  be  Baby  ?  He  heard  the 
call  again.  It  was  nearer.  A  little  shadow  fell  sud- 
denly upon  the  floor  of  his  room.  And  then,  in  the 


96         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

window,  with  the  shaft  of  moonlight  all  about  her, 
stood  Mrs.  Lennox. 

Peter  caught  his  breath  and  clambered  out  of  his 
bed.  "What  is  it?"  he  asked.  "What's  the  mat- 
ter?" 

The  woman  ran  in  with  a  glad  cry.  "  Oh,  Peter ! 
I  thought  you  had  gone  out  of  your  room,"  she  whis- 
pered, "  and  I  didn't  know  what  to  do.  I  saw  a  hide- 
ous figure  walk  through  my  wall  just  after  I  had  put 
out  my  light,  and  when  it  came  towards  me  with  long, 
bony  ringers,  I  rushed  out  and  came  to  you.  Oh,  hold 
me,  Peter,  hold  me!  I'm  terrified  and  as  cold  as  a 
frog!" 

She  slipped  into  his  arms,  all  young  and  sweet  and 
incoherent,  trembling  like  a  little  bird  in  a  thunder- 
storm. It  was  a  most  calculated  piece  of  perfect  act- 
ing. 

Peter's  heart  seemed  to  jump  into  his  mouth.  The 
flowing  hair  of  the  little  head  that  lay  on  his  chest  was 
full  of  the  most  intoxicating  scent. 

"  I'll  —  I'll  go  and  see  what  it  is,"  he  said  abruptly. 

"  No,  no !  Don't  go.  I  can't  let  you  go,  Peter. 
Stay  with  me !  " 

"  Rut,  if  there's  a  man  in  your  room " 

"  It  wasn't  a  man.  It  was  the  ghost  that  belongs  to 
the  family.  It  always  comes  before  some  dreadful 
accident.  Oh,  darling,  stay  with  me!  Take  care  of 
me !  I'm  terrified !  " 

She  clung  to  him  in  a  very  ecstasy  of  fright  and 
the  closeness  and  warmth  of  her  body  sent  Peter's 
brain  whirling.  He  tried  to  speak,  to  think  of  some- 


YOUTH  97 

thing  to  say,  but  all  his  thoughts  were  in  the  swirl  of 
a  mill-stream,  and  he  held  her  tighter  and  put  his  face 
against  her  hair,  while  his  heart  pumped  and  every 
preconceived  idea,  every  hard-fought-for  ideal  went 
crash. 

"  I  love  you.  I  love  you,  Peter.  My  Peter !  "  she 
whispered.  "  Who  but  you  should  shelter  me  and 
hold  me  and  keep  me  in  your  arms!  Keep  me  with 
you  always,  night  and  day.  Look  into  my  eyes  and 
see  how  much  you  mean  to  me,  my  man." 

She  raised  her  head  and  stood  on  tiptoe.  The  jeal- 
ous moon  had  laid  its  light  upon  her  face  and  her  eyes 
were  shining  and  her  lips  were  parted,  and  the  slight 
silk  covering  had  fallen  from  her  shoulder.  The 
whiteness  of  it  dazzled. 

"  Oh,  my  God !  "  said  Peter,  but  as  he  bent  to  kiss 
her  mouth,  momentarily  drunk  with  the  touch  and 
scent  of  her,  someone  shouted  his  name  and  thumped 
on  his  door,  and  Mrs.  Lennox  tore  herself  away  and 
ran  through  the  window  like  a  moon-woman. 

The  door  was  flung  open.  Fountain  came  in,  his 
voice  a  little  thick.  "  I  say,  Guthrie,  are  you  getting 
up  early  in  the  morning?  'Cause,  if  so,  I'll  take  you 
on  for  nine  holes  before  breakfast.  What  d'yer  say? 
Coin'  to  get  healthy,  d'yer  see?  What?  " 

Peter  found  his  voice.     "  All  right !  "  he  said. 

"  Will  you  ?  Good  man.  Give  me  a  call  at  six, 
will  you?  We'll  bathe  in  the  pool  before  coming  in. 
So  long  then."  And  out  he  went  again,  lurching  a 
little  and  banging  the  door  behind  him. 

For  several  queer  minutes  Peter  stood  swaying,  with 


98         THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

his  breath  nearly  gone  as  though  he  had  been  rowing, 
and  one  big  hand  on  his  throbbing  head.  And  as  he 
stood  there  the  posts  of  the  bed  seemed  to  turn  into 
trees  and  its  cover  into  soft  grass  all  alive  with  the 
yellow  heads  of  "  bread  and  cheese,"  and  among  them 
sat  Betty,  with  her  eyes  full  of  love,  confidence  and 
implicit  faith, —  Betty,  for  whom  he  had  saved  him- 
self. 

And  then  he  started  walking  about  the  room.  Up 
and  down  he  went  —  up  and  down  —  cursing  himself 
and  his  weakness  which  had  nearly  smashed  his  dream 
and  put  his  loyalty  into  the  dust. 

And  when, —  she  also  had  cursed, —  Mrs.  Lennox 
stole  back,  as  sweet  and  alluring  as  ever,  and  even 
more  determined,  she  found  that  Peter  had  re-lit  his 
candles,  got  into  his  dressing-gown  again  and  was  sit- 
ting at  the  table  writing. 

"Peter!     Peter!"  she  called. 

But  he  didn't  hear. 

"  Peter ! "  she  whispered,  and  went  nearer  and 
nearer  until  her  body  rested  against  his  shoulder. 

"  Oh,  I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said,  rising.  "  Is  it 
all  right  now?  That's  fine.  It's  just  a  touch  cold. 
Don't  you  think  you'd  better  be  in  bed  ?  " 

Baby  Lennox  had  seen  the  beginning  of  the  letter, 
"  My  own  Betty."  She  nodded,  drew  back  her  upper 
lip  in  a  queer  smile  and  turned  and  went.  She  was 
clever  enough  to  know  that  she  had  lost. 

And  then  Peter  bent  again  over  his  letter,  and  in 
writing  to  the  little  girl  whom  he  adored  with  all  his 
heart,  he  was  safe. 


PART  TWO 

THE    CITY 


"  MOTHER  took  the  car  to  Lord  &  Taylor's,"  said 
Belle,  looking  herself  over  in  the  long  glass  with  a 
scrutiny  that  was  eventually  entirely  favorable.  "  I 
guess  it'll  do  us  good  to  walk." 

"  I'd  simply  love  to,"  said  Betty.  "  But  I  must  just 
run  in  and  tell  father  I'm  going  to  have  dinner  with 
you.  I  won't  be  a  minute." 

"  All  right,  my  dear.  Time's  cheap.  Don't  hurry 
on  my  account." 

Belle  went  over  to  the  dressing-table.  She  had  only 
recently  powdered  her  nose  from  the  elaborate  ap- 
paratus from  which  she  rarely  permitted  herself  to  be 
separated,  but  a  little  more  would  do  no  harm.  She 
burst  into  involuntary  song  as  she  performed  a  trick 
which  she  might  so  well  have  afforded  to  leave  to  those 
ladies  of  doubtful  summers  to  whose  Anno  Domini 
complexions  the  thick  disguise  of  powder  may  perhaps 
be  useful.  Tucked  into  her  blouse  there  was  a  letter 
from  Kenyon  which  had  come  a  week  ago.  It  was 
only  a  matter  of  days  before  she  was  to  see  him  again. 

And  Betty  ran  out  of  her  bedroom  and  along  a 
passage  which  led  to  the  studio.  A  stretch  of  cloud- 
less sky  could  be  seen  through  a  recess  window,  and 
the  far-below  flat  roofs  of  the  old  buildings  on  the 
corner  of  Gramercy  Park.  She  knocked  and  waited. 
There  was  a  grunt,  and  she  went  in. 


102        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Into  the  large  lofty  room  —  a  cross  between  a  barn 
and  an  attic  —  a  hard  north  light  was  falling  with 
cruel  accuracy.  It  showed  up  stacks  of  unframed 
canvasses  with  their  faces  turned  to  the  dark  wall  and 
the  imperfections  of  several  massive  pieces  of  oak,  the 
worn  appearance  of  the  stained  floor,  the  age  of  the 
Persian  rugs  and  of  a  florid  woman  who  sat  with 
studied  grace  and  an  anxious  expression  of  pleasant 
thought  on  the  dais,  with  one  indecently  beringed  hand 
resting  with  strained  nonchalance  on  the  arm  of  her 
chair  and  the  other  about  an  ineffably  bored  Pekingese. 

Ranken  Townsend,  the  successful  portrait  painter, 
had  backed  away  from  his  almost  life-size  canvas, 
and  with  his  fine  untidy  head  on  one  side  and  irrita- 
tion in  his  red-grey  beard  was  glaring  at  it  with  savage 
antagonism. 

The  lady  on  the  dais  had  crow's-feet  round  her 
made-up  eyes,  and  a  chin  that  could  not  be  made  any- 
thing but  double  however  high  she  held  it.  Also  — 
as  the  north  light  seemed  to  take  a  hideous  delight  in 
proving  —  her  figure  was  irreclaimably  dumpy  and 
plump.  The  lady  on  the  canvas,  however, —  such  is 
Art  that  runs  an  expensive  studio,  good  wines  and 
well-preserved  Coronas, —  was  slight  and  lovely  and 
patrician,  and  should  she  stand  up,  at  least  six  feet 
tall.  No  wonder  Townsend  grunted  and  glared  at  the 
commercial  fraud  in  front  of  him,  at  which,  in  his 
good,  idealistic,  hungry  Paris  days  he  would  have  slung 
wet  brushes  and  the  honest  curses  of  the  Place  Pigalle. 
He  was  selling  his  gift  once  more  for  five  thousand 
dollars.  His  wife  dressed  at  Bendels. 


THE  CITY  103 

Anger  and  irritation  went  out  of  the  painter's  eyes 
when  he  saw  the  sweet  face  that  peeked  in.  "  Hello, 
sweetheart ! "  he  sang  out.  "  Come  in  and  bring  a 
touch  of  sun.  Mrs.  Vandervelde,  I'd  like  you  to  meet 
my  little  girl." 

Without  turning  her  head  or  breaking  a  pose  that 
she  considered  to  have  become,  after  many  serious  at- 
tempts, extremely  effective,  the  much-paragraphed 
lady,  whose  lizard-covered  mansion  in  Fifth  Avenue 
was  always  one  of  the  objects  touched  upon  by  the 
megaphone  men  in  rubber-neck  wagons,  murmured  a 
few  words.  "  How  d'you  do,  child  ?  How  well  you 
look." 

Betty  smothered  a  laugh.  Mrs.  Vandervelde  had 
acquired  the  habit  of  looking  through  her  ears.  "  I'm 
going  home  with  Belle,  father,  and  I  shall  stay  to  din- 
ner. But  I'll  be  back  before  ten." 

"  Will  you  ?  All  right."  He  tilted  up  her  face  and 
kissed  it.  "  I'm  dining  at  the  National  Arts  Club  to- 
night, and  I  guess  I  shall  be  late."  He  pointed  his 
brush  at  the  canvas  and  made  the  grimace  of  a  man 
who's  obliged  to  swallow  a  big  dose  of  evil-smelling 
physic.  So  Betty,  who  understood  and  was  sorry, 
put  his  hand  to  her  lips,  bowed  to  the  indifferent  lady 
and  slipped  away.  The  room  was  perceptibly  colder 
when  she  left.  The  picture  was  already  four  thousand 
two  hundred  dollars  toward  completion,  and  Betty  was 
just  as  much  relieved  as  her  father,  who  returned  an- 
grily to  work  to  paint  in  the  diamonds.  He  was  sick 
of  that  smile. 

While  waiting  for  the  elevator,  Belle  gave  a  rather 


104        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

self-conscious  laugh  and  lifted  her  tight  skirt  quickly. 
"  Seen  the  latest,  Betty  ?"  She  showed  a  tiny  square 
watch  edged  with  diamonds  worn  as  a  garter.  "  Cun- 
ning, isn't  it  ?  " 

"  Why,  I  should  just  think  it  was !  Where  did  you 
buy  it?" 

"  Buy  it  ?  My  dear,  can  you  see  me  paying 
three  hundred  dollars  for  something  that  doesn't 
show?  Harry  Spearman  gave  it  to  me  last  night, 
and  put  it  on  in  his  car  on  the  way  to  the  Pierrot 
Club." 

"Put  it  on?" 

Belle  threw  back  her  beautiful  head  and  burst  out 
laughing.  "  You  said  that  just  like  the  Quaker  girl 
in  the  play  at  the  Hudson.  Why  shouldn't  he  put  it 
on?  It  amused  him  and  didn't  hurt  me.  He's  a 
sculptor,  and  like  the  bus-conductor,  '  legs  is  no  treat 
to  him,'  anyway." 

They  entered  the  elevator,  dropped  nine  floors  to 
the  wide  foyer  of  the  palatial  apartment  house,  and 
went  out  into  the  street.  It  was  a  typical  New  York 
October  afternoon  —  the  sky  blue  and  clear,  the  sun 
warm  and  the  air  alive  with  that  pinch  of  ozone  of 
which  no  other  city  in  the  world  can  boast.  The  girls 
instinctively  made  their  way  towards  Fifth  Avenue, 
warily  dodging  the  amazing  traffic,  the  struggling 
wagons  and  plunging  horses  going  in  and  out  of  build- 
ings in  course  of  ear-splitting  construction,  and  coal- 
chutes,  in  the  middle  of  the  sidewalks. 

"  But  you  were  not  at  the  opening  of  the  Pierrot 
Club  last  night,"  said  Betty.  "  I  heard  you  tell  Mrs. 


THE  CITY  105 

Guthrie  that  you  were  dining  with  the  Delanos  and 
going  to  their  theatre  party." 

"  I  know.  But  Harry  Spearman  sent  round  a  note 
in  the  afternoon  asking  me  to  have  dinner  with  him 
at  Delmonico's  and  go  on  to  the  Club  to  dance.  I  had 
such  a  severe  headache  that  I  rang  up  Mrs.  Delano 
and  reluctantly  begged  to  be  excused.  To  quote 
Nicholas,  theatre  parties  with  elderly  people  bore  me 
stiff.  As  it  was,  I  had  a  perfectly  corking  time  till 
one  o'clock  and  danced  every  dance." 

"Did  you  tell  Mrs.  Guthrie?" 

"  For  Heaven's  sake,  Betty,  what  do  you  take  me 
for  ?  Mother  isn't  my  school-teacher  and  I  don't  have 
to  ask  her  for  permission  to  live.  I  have  my  latch- 
key and  dear  little  mother  is  perfectly  happy.  As  she 
never  knows  what  I  do  she  never  has  to  worry  about 
me ;  and,  as  she  always  says,  I  can  only  be  young  once." 
A  curious  little  smile  played  round  her  very  red  lips. 
"  It's  true  that  Harry  Spearman  is  rather  unmanage- 
able when  he  gets  one  alone  in  a  car  after  several  hours 
of  champagne  and  ragtime,  but  —  oh,  well,  I  guess  I 
can  take  care  of  myself.  Do  you  know,  I  don't  think 
the  Pierrot  Club's  going  to  be  as  good  this  winter. 
It's  a  year  old,  you  see.  Everybody's  going  to  the  new 
room  at  the  Plaza  —  that  is,  everybody  back  from  the 
country.  It's  rather  a  pity,  I  think.  I  like  the  Club, 
but  the  motto  of  New  York  is  *  Follow  the  Crowd/ 
and  so  the  Plaza's  for  me." 

Betty's  admiration  for  her  school-fellow  and  closest 
friend  was  invincible  and  her  loyalty  very  true.  It 
made  her  therefore  a  little  uneasy  to  notice  about  her 


106        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

a  growing  artificiality  which  was  neither  attractive  nor 
characteristic.  She  knew  better  than  anyone  that 
Belle  was  a  remarkable  girl.  She  had  a  kind  heart. 
She  possessed  that  rarest  of  gifts,  a  sense  of  gratitude, 
and  if  her  talent  for  writing  had  been  properly  de- 
veloped she  might  eventually  have  made  her  mark. 
She  had  a  quick  perception  —  sympathy  and  imagina- 
tion not  often  found  in  so  young  a  girl  —  an  uncanny 
ear  for  the  right  word  —  and  if  she  chose  to  exercise 
it,  quite  an  unusual  power  of  concentration.  It  seemed 
to  Betty  to  be  such  a  pity  that,  just  at  the  moment  when 
Belle  left  school  with  her  mind  filled  with  ideals  and 
the  ambition  to  make  something  of  herself  and  do 
things,  the  Doctor  found  himself  a  rich  man.  The  in- 
centive to  work  which  the  constant  need  for  economy 
had  awakened  in  her  went  out  like  a  snuffed  candle. 
From  having  before  been  in  the  habit  of  saying,  with 
eager  enthusiasm,  "  I'm  going  to  do  such  and  such  a 
thing,  whatever  the  odds,"  she  immediately  began  to 
say :  "  Oh,  my  dear,  what's  the  use  ?  "  Everything 
for  which  she  had  intended  to  work  became  now  hers 
for  the  asking.  Her  father  gave  her  a  free  hand  in 
the  matter  of  entertaining  her  young  friends.  She 
could  order  what  books  she  wished  to  read  from  Bren- 
tano's,  and  she  had  a  generous  allowance  on  which  to 
dress.  Like  a  chameleon  she  quickly  changed  the 
rather  dull  colors  of  her  former  surroundings  for 
those  bright  ones  which  the  sudden  accession  to  wealth 
made  it  easy  to  acquire.  Her  outlook  was  no  longer 
that  of  the  daughter  of  an  overworked  general  prac- 
titioner whose  income  had  to  be  carefully  managed  in 


THE  CITY  107 

order  to  live  not  too  far  up-town  and  educate  a  family 
of  four,  but  of  a  debutante  whose  parents  entertained 
distinguished  men  and  women  in  a  fashionable  street 
and  whose  friends  were  equally  well  off.  Her  in- 
herited and  cultivated  energy  was,  of  course,  obliged 
to  find  vent  in  some  direction,  since  it  was  not  em- 
ployed in  the  development  of  her  talent;  and  it  was 
now  burnt  up  in  a  restless  search  of  enjoyment,  a  con- 
stant series  of  engagements  to  lunch  and  dine,  and  do 
the  theatre  and  dance, —  especially  dance.  The  ordi- 
nary healthy,  high-spirited  young  man,  who  had  not 
much  to  say  for  himself,  quickly  bored  her.  Her  wits 
required  to  be  kept  sharp,  her  latent  intelligence  needed 
something  on  which  to  feed.  It  was  therefore  natural 
that  she  should  throw  her  smiles  at  men  much  older 
and  far  more  experienced  than  herself  and  who,  from 
the  fact  that  they  did  not  intend  to  give  anything  for 
nothing,  exercised  her  ingenuity  and  native  wit  to  keep 
them  in  order.  In  a  word,  she  found  that  playing 
with  fire  and  avoiding  being  burned  kept  that  side  of 
her  in  good  condition  which,  in  her  old  circumstances, 
would  have  been  devoted  to  work.  And  so  with  a 
sort  of  conscious  superficiality  she  had  allowed  herself 
to  flit  from  one  unmeaning  incident  to  another  and  en- 
tered into  a  series  of  artificial  flirtations  with  men 
who  had  no  scruples  and  one  passion  simply  in  order 
to  kill  time.  Her  carelessness  led  her  into  episodes, 
the  merest  hint  of  which  would  have  thrown  dear  lit- 
tle Mrs.  Guthrie  into  a  panic,  and  her  coolness  per- 
mitted her  to  escape  from  them  with  perhaps  more  in- 
genuity than  dignity.  Even  upon  her  return  from 


io8        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

England  with  her  heart  full  of  Nicholas  Kenyon,  and 
with  a  desire  to  see  him  again  that  kept  her  awake 
at  night,  she  frittered  away  her  superfluous  energy 
with  this  Harry  Spearman,  whom  no  woman  with  any 
respect  for  her  daughter  would  willingly  allow  within 
a  mile  of  her,  even  if  properly  chaperoned. 

Betty,  being  one  of  those  girls  who  had  never  been 
suspected  of  any  talent,  but  who  nevertheless  had  it 
in  her  to  perform  a  far  more  womanly  and  beautiful 
thing  than  to  write  books  or  plays  —  to  be  in  fact  a 
good  wife  to  the  man  she  loved  and  a  good  mother  to 
his  children  —  looked  at  Belle's  way  of  living  with 
growing  anxiety.  She  was  not  a  prude  or  a  prig. 
She  had  not  been  allowed  out  in  the  world  with  eyes 
all  curious  to  see  the  truth  of  things  through  a  veil  of 
false  modesty.  Her  father,  a  wise  and  humane  man, 
had  seen  to  that.  She  delighted  in  enjoyment,  went 
to  the  theatre  whenever  she  had  the  opportunity  and 
danced  herself  out  of  shoes.  But,  not  being  ambitious 
to  shine,  she  was  content  to  apply  her  energy  to  the 
ordinary  work  that  came  to  her  to  do, —  the  practical, 
everyday,  undramatic,  domestic  things  that  cropped 
up  hourly  in  the  strange  house  where  the  father  was 
an  artist  and  the  mother  suffered  from  individualism 
and  was  a  leader  of  new  movements.  Leaving  school 
to  find  a  home  in  a  constant  state  of  chaos,  her  father 
rarely  out  of  his  studio,  her  mother  always  in  the 
throes  of  committee  meetings  and  speech-making, — 
she  knuckled  down  to  set  it  in  order,  to  clear  out 
an  extravagant  cook  with  an  appetite  for  hysterics, 
and  a  sloppy  Irish  waitress  whose  hairpins  fell  every- 


THE  CITY  109 

where  and  whose  loose  hand  dropped  things  of  value 
almost  before  it  touched  them.  This  done  she  found 
others  and  appointed  herself  housekeeper,  and  the  du- 
ties of  this  position  kept  her  both  busy  and  happy, — 
the  one  being  hyphenated  to  the  other.  But  even  if 
her  father  had  been,  like  Dr.  Guthrie,  a  rich  man  in- 
stead of  one  who  lived  up  to  every  penny  that  he 
earned  and  generally  several  thousand  dollars  beyond, 
she  had  nothing  in  her  character  that,  however  little 
she  was  occupied,  would  have  allowed  her  to  look  at 
life  from  the  modern  standpoint  of  Belle  and  her  other 
friends.  She  was  —  and  rejoiced  in  the  fact  —  old- 
fashioned.  Most  of  her  ideas  were  what  is  now  scoff- 
ingly  called  "  early  Victorian,"  because  they  were  not 
loose  and  careless,  and  the  many  things  that  Belle  and 
others  found  "  fearfully  amusing  "  were,  to  her,  im- 
possible. She  didn't,  for  instance,  leave  her  petticoat 
in  the  cloak-room  when  she  went  to  dances,  so  that 
her  partners  might  find  her  better  fun.  She  didn't 
go  to  tea  alone  with  mere  acquaintances  in  bachelor 
apartments,  or  for  taxi  rides  with  her  partner  between 
dances.  She  never  made  herself  cheap,  and  went  out 
of  her  way  to  avoid  men  whose  eyes  ran  calculatingly 
over  her  figure.  These  things  and  many  others 
merely  appealed  to  her  as  the  perquisite  of  those  girls 
who  did  not  place  a  very  high  value  upon  self-respect. 
The  Guthries  lived  at  55  East  Fifty-second  Street. 
It  was  the  house  which  the  man  whom  Dr.  Guthrie 
called  his  benefactor  had  built  for  himself  and  left  to 
the  doctor  whom  he  was  proud  to  endow.  The 
architect  who  had  been  employed  had  been  given  a 


no        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

free  hand.  He  had  not  been  required  to  mix  his  styles 
or  perform  extraordinary  architectural  gymnastics  of 
any  kind.  The  result  of  his  efforts  was  good.  It 
was  a  house  such  as  one  sees  in  one  of  the  numerous 
old  London  squares  within  sound  of  the  mellow  clock 
of  St.  James's  Palace.  Addison  might  have  lived  in 
it,  or  Walpole  or  Pepys.  Its  face  was  scrupulously 
plain  and  its  doorway  was  modelled  on  those  of  the 
Adams  period.  Standing  between  two  very  florid 
examples  of  modern  architecture  it  made  one  think 
of  the  portrait  of  a  charming  early  Victorian  gentle- 
woman between  the  photographs  of  two  present-day 
chorus  ladies  in  hoopskirts  and  a  cloud  of  chiffon. 
The  rooms  were  large  and  lofty  and  were  all  furnished 
with  great  simplicity  and  taste.  There  was  nothing 
in  them  except  old  furniture  which  had  been  collected 
in  England  by  its  late  owner,  piece  by  piece,  and  its 
oak  chests,  armoires  and  secretaries,  china  closets, 
corner  pieces  and  Chippendale  chairs  were  very  good 
to  look  at  and  live  with.  So  also  were  the  pictures, 

—  Cattermoles,  Bartalozzi  engravings,  colored  prints 
and  a  half-dozen  priceless  oil  paintings  by  old  masters, 

—  which  made  the  small,  cunning,  unscrupulous,  eager 
mouths  of  the  numerous  art  collectors  of  New  York 
water  with  desire.     The  library,  too,  out  of  which  led 
the  Doctor's  laboratory,  was  almost  unique,  and  con- 
tained first  editions  and  specimens  of  rare  and  beau- 
tiful book-binding  which  filled  the  Doctor's  heart  with 
constant  pleasure  and  delight.     It  was  nearly  a  year 
before  the  man  who  had  struggled  so  hard  to  lift 
himself  out  of  his  father's  small  farm  could  believe 


THE  CITY  in 

that  he  wasn't  walking  in  his  sleep  when  he  passed 
through  these  beautiful  rooms,  and  often  he  was 
obliged  to  pinch  himself  to  make  sure  that  he  was  not 
dreaming. 

There  was  however  one  room  in  this  house  which 
would  have  given  its  late  owner  many  shudders  to 
enter.  This  was  the  little  mother's  own  particular 
room,  the  windows  of  which  looked  out  upon  that 
row  of  small,  red,  bandbox-like  houses  opposite  which 
had  managed  to  remain  standing  in  spite  of  the 
rapacious  hands  of  reconstruction  companies  which 
are  never  so  happy  as  when  destroying  old  landmarks 
and  tearing  down  old  buildings.  Into  this  room  Mrs. 
Guthrie  had  placed  all  the  furniture  of  her  first  sitting- 
room, —  cheap,  late  Victorian  stuff  of  which  she  had 
been  so  inordinately  and  properly  proud  when  she 
started  housekeeping  with  the  young  doctor.  From 
these  things  Mrs.  Guthrie  could  not  be  parted.  They 
were  all  redolent  with  good  and  tender  memories  and 
were  to  her  mind  far  more  valuable  and  more  beau- 
tiful than  all  the  priceless  old  oak  pieces  put  to- 
gether. 

Curiously  enough  —  or  perhaps  not  curiously  at  all 
—  this  was  Peter's  favorite  room,  too,  and  he  never 
entered  it  without  renewing  his  vows  to  climb  to  the 
top  of  his  own  tree,  as  his  father  had  done.  Belle, 
Graham  and  Ethel  all  laughed  at  the  little  mother  for 
clinging  to  this  "  rubbish,"  as  they  called  it,  which 
was  so  out  of  keeping  with  the  rest  of  the  house. 
But  Peter  sympathized  with  her  and  never  failed  while 
sitting  there  in  the  evening,  in  close  and  intimate  con- 


ii2        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

versation  with  the  dear  little  woman  who  meant  so 
much  to  him,  to  get  from  it  a  new  desire  to  emulate 
his  father  and  make  his  own  way  in  the  same  brave 
spirit. 

When  Belle  and  Betty  arrived  at  East  Fifty-second 
Street  —  a  little  tired  after  their  walk  —  they  found 
Graham  in  the  hall.  "  Oh,  hello!  "  said  he.  "  Been 
shopping?  " 

"  No,"  answered  Belle,  "  nothing  tempted  us. 
We've  walked  all  the  way  home  from  Gramercy  Park, 
—  some  walk!  Everything  I've  got  on  is  sticking 
to  me.  Aren't  you  home  early,  Graham  ?  " 

Graham  nodded.  "  Nothing  doing,"  he  said. 
"  Besides,  I'm  dining  early."  He  turned  to  Belle  with 
a  rather  curious  smile.  "  I  thought  you  were  to  be 
with  the  Delanos  last  night." 

Belle  tilted  her  chin.  "  I  was.  I  dined  there,  went 
to  the  Winter  Garden  and  then  danced  at  Bus- 
tanoby's." 

"  I  caught  sight  of  you  in  Spearman's  car  some- 
where about  one  o'clock  in  the  morning.  Did  he  drive 
you  home  ?  " 

"  I  guess  he  did,  dear  boy,"  said  Belle,  blandly,  "  and 
by  the  way,  we  saw  you,  going  in  to  supper  somewhere 
with  a  girl  with  a  Vogue  face  and  an  open-air  back!  " 

Graham  laughed.  "  That's  different,"  he  said. 
"  Spearman  isn't  the  sort  of  man  I  care  to  see  my  sis- 
ter going  about  with  alone.  I  advise  you  to  be  a  little 
more  fastidious." 

"  Thank  you,  Graham  darling,"  said  Belle,  quite  un- 
moved, "  but  I'm  old  enough  to  choose  my  own  friends 


THE  CITY  113 

without  your  butting  in.     Just  for  fun,  would  you  tell 
me  what  you  know  about  the  word  fastidious  ?  " 

"  That's  different,"  said  Graham  again.  And  he 
went  up-stairs  to  his  own  room  with  rather  heavy 
feet. 

Belle  looked  at  Betty  and  a  little  smile  curled  up 
the  corners  of  her  beautiful  red  mouth.  "  I  don't  see 
anything  wrong  with  Harry  Spearman,  and  he's  an 
old  friend  of  the  Delanos.  My  word,  but  isn't 
Graham  a  good  sport  ?  " 

Presently  when  they  went  into  the  drawing-room 
they  found  little  Mrs.  Guthrie  sitting  in  front  of  the- 
table  with  a  more  than  usually  happy  smile,  and  Ethel 
lying  on  the  sofa  looking  the  very  epitome  of  an  inter- 
esting invalid.  With  a  slightly  critical  frown  on  her 
pretty  face  she  was  reading  Wells's  latest  novel, —  a 
full-blooded  effort  well  calculated  to  improve  the  con- 
dition of  a  girl  of  fifteen  who  had  not  gone  back  to 
school  on  account  of  anaemia. 

With  quick  intuition,  and  one  glance  at  her  mother's 
face,  Belle  knew  she  had  heard  from  Peter.  "  Any 
news?"  she  asked  eagerly. 

"  Yes,  darling, —  the  very  best  of  news.  A  Mar- 
coni from  my  boy,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie. 

"What  does  he  say?" 

"Oh,  what  does  he  say?"  asked  Betty.  But  the 
question  was  asked  mentally,  because  little  Mrs. 
Guthrie  was  happy  and  must  not  be  made  jealous. 

Putting  on  her  glasses  with  great  deliberation,  Mrs. 
Guthrie  picked  up  a  book,  and  with  a  smile  of  pride 
and  excitement  hunted  through  its  pages  and  even- 


ii4        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

tually  produced  the  cable  form,  which  she  had  used 
as  a  marker. 

"Do  hurry,  mother,  dear!"  cried  Belle.  News 
from  Peter  meant  news  from  Nicholas. 

"  Now  please  don't  fluster  me,  Belle.  Of  course 
I  would  unfold  it  the  wrong  side  up,  wouldn't  I? 
Well,  this  is  what  he  says :  '  Expect  to  dock  day  after 
to-morrow,  dearest  Mum.  All  my  love.' ' 

"  Is  that  all  he  says  ?  Is  there  nothing  about  his  — 
his  friend?" 

Ethel  gave  a  quiet  chuckle,  of  which  Belle  coldly 
took  no  notice. 

"  There  are  a  few  more  words,"  replied  Mrs. 
Guthrie,  "and  I  expect  they  were  very  expen- 
sive." 

"  Oh,  mother,  darling;  do  go  on! " 

"  Let  me  see,  now.     Oh,  yes.     '  And  to  Betty.' ' 

"Oh,  thank  you,"  said  Betty.  "Oh,  Peter,  my 
Peter ! "  she  cried  in  her  heart. 

This  time  Ethel  laughed.  But  no  one  noticed  it. 
It  was  rather  disappointing. 

"  At  last  I  shall  see  Nicholas  again,"  thought  Belle, 
—"at  last!" 

And  the  little  mother  folded  up  the  cable  very  care- 
fully and  slipped  it  back  into  the  book.  Peter  had 
sent  it  to  her, —  to  her. 

And  then  Belle  turned  her  attention  to  her  little 
sister,  who  not  only  looked  most  interesting,  but  knew 
that  she  did.  "  I  think  you  condescended  to  be 
amused,  Grandmamma,"  she  said,  in  the  most  good- 
natured  spirit  of  chaff.  Like  everybody  else  in  the 


THE  CITY  115 

family  she  was  really  rather  proud  of  this  very  fin- 
ished production  of  an  ultra-modern  and  fashionable 
school. 

"  I  seem  to  have  missed  a  lot  of  fun  by  not  go- 
ing to  Europe,"  replied  Ethel.  "  It  would  have  been 
very  entertaining  to  watch  you  and  Betty  fall  in 
love." 

"  I  guess  so,"  said  Belle.  "  The  only  thing  is  that 
you  would  have  been  very  much  odd  man  out.  They 
draw  the  line  at  little  school-girls  at  Oxford." 

"  Now  don't  begin  to  quarrel,  girls,"  said  Mrs. 
Guthrie.  "  I'm  very  sorry  Ethel  wasn't  with  us. 
The  trip  would  have  widened  her  view  and  given  her 
much  to  think  about.  But  never  mind.  She  shall  go 
with  us  next  time." 

Ethel  stifled  a  yawn.  "  Thank  you,  mamma,  dear. 
But  when  I  go  to  England  I  may  elect  to  stay  there. 
I  think  it's  very  probable  that  I  shall  marry  an  Eng- 
lishman and  settle  down  to  country  life,  doing  London 
in  the  season." 

Belle's  laugh  rang  out.  "  That's  the  sort  of  thing 
we  have  to  put  up  with,  Betty,"  she  said.  "  You're 
going  to  marry  a  Duke,  aren't  you,  Baby,  and  be  a 
Lady  in  Waiting  at  Court,  with  a  full-page  photo- 
graph every  week  in  the  Tatler?  When  Peter  comes 
home  he'll  find  you  a  constant  source  of  joy.  My 
descriptions  of  the  way  in  which  you've  come  on  while 
he's  been  away  always  made  him  laugh." 

Ethel  rose  languidly  from  the  sofa,  at  the  side  of 
which  a  little  nourishment  had  been  served.  Mrs. 
Guthrie,  who  had  been  busily  at  work  knitting  a  scarf 


ii6        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

for  Graham  —  a  thing  that  he  would  certainly  never 
wear  —  went  quickly  to  give  her  a  hand.  "  Are  you 
going  to  your  room  now,  darling  ?  "  she  asked. 

Ethel  caught  Belle's  rather  sceptical  eye  and,  with 
exquisite  coolness,  entirely  ignored  its  suggestion  that 
she  was  shamming.  "  Yes,  mamma,  dear.  I  shall 
go  to  bed  almost  at  once.  There's  nothing  like  sleep 
for  anaemia.  Of  course  I  shall  have  to  read  for  a 
little  while,  because  insomnia  goes  with  my  complaint, 
but  I  shall  fall  off  as  soon  as  I  can.  Please  don't 
come  in  to-night,  in  case  you  disturb  me.  I'll  tell 
Ellen  to  put  my  hot  milk  in  a  thermos." 

Belle  burst  into  another  laugh.  "  You  beat  the 
band,"  she  said.  "  Any  one  would  think  that  your 
school  was  for  the  daughters  of  royalty.  I  know 
exactly  what  Nicholas  Kenyon  will  call  you." 

Ethel  turned  towards  her  sister  with  raised  eye- 
brows. With  her  rather  retrousse  nose,  fine,  wide- 
apart  eyes  and  soft  round  chin  she  looked  very  pretty 
and  amazingly  self-composed.  Her  poise  was  that  of 
a  woman  who  had  been  a  leader  of  society  for  years. 
"  Yes?  And  what  will  that  be?  " 

"  The  queen  of  the  Flappers,"  said  Belle. 

Ethel  picked  up  her  book,  carefully  placing  the 
marker.  "  Oxford  slang  leaves  me  cold,"  she  said, 
loftily. 

"  I  certainly  hope  that  he'll  call  her  nothing  of  the 
sort,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie.  " '  Flapper.'  What  a  ter- 
rible word !  What  does  it  mean  ?  " 

"  It  means  girls  under  seventeen  who  have  discov- 
ered all  the  secrets  of  life,  the  value  of  a  pair  of  pretty 


THE  CITY  117 

ankles  and  exactly  how  to  get  everybody  else  to  do 
things  for  them.  It's  the  best  word  I  heard  in  Eng- 
land." 

"  Nicholas  Kenyon  sounds  to  me  rather  a  precocious 
boy,"  said  Ethel. 

"Boy!  Nicholas  Kenyon  a  boy  —  !  Well!" 
Belle  acknowledged  herself  beaten.  She  could  find 
no  other  words. 

The  little  mother  put  her  arm,  with  great  affection, 
around  the  shoulders  of  her  youngest  child,  of  whom 
she  was  extremely  proud  and  a  little  frightened. 
"  Never  mind,  darling,"  she  said.  "  Belle  doesn't 
mean  anything.  It's  only  her  fun." 

"  Oh,  that's  all  right,  mamma.  I  make  full  allow- 
ance for  Belle.  She's  a  little  crude  yet,  but  she'll 
improve  in  time." 

Belle  gave  a  scream  of  joy.  Her  sense  of  the 
ridiculous,  always  extremely  keen,  made  her  delight 
in  her  little  sister  and  the  perfectly  placid  way  in  which 
she  sailed  through  existence  with  the  lofty  superiority 
of  her  type  —  a  type  that  is  the  peculiar  result  of 
supercivilization  and  the  deferential  treatment  of  fash- 
ionable schoolmistresses  who  bow  to  wealth  as  before 
a  god. 

"  Run  in  and  say  good-night  to  father.  He  won't 
mind  being  disturbed  for  a  moment  by  you." 

"  I  don't  think  I  will,"  said  Ethel.  "  The  sight  of 
his  laboratory  may  give  me  a  nightmare.  I  really 
must  be  careful  about  myself  just  now.  Good  night, 
mamma  dear.  Don't  sit  up  too  late.  Good  night, 
Belle.  I  should  advise  you  to  go  to  bed  at  once. 


ii8        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Your  complexion  is  beginning  to  show  the  effects  of 
late  hours  already." 

"Oh,  you  funny  little  thing,"  said  Belle.  "You 
give  me  a  pain.  Trot  off  to  bed ;  and  instead  of  read- 
ing Wells,  Ibsen  and  George  Bernard  Shaw,  try  a 
course  of  Louisa  Alcott  and  a  dose  of  Swiss  Family 
Robinson.  That'll  do  you  much  more  good  and  make 
you  a  little  more  human." 

But  even  this  plain  sisterly  speaking  had  no  ap- 
parent effect.  Ethel  gave  Betty,  who  had  been  watch- 
ing and  listening  to  the  little  bout  with  the  surprise 
of  an  only  child,  a  small  peck  on  the  cheek.  "  Good 
night,  dear  Betty,"  she  said.  "  I'm  glad  that  you're 
going  to  be  my  sister-in-law.  Unless  Peter  has 
changed  very  much  since  he's  been  away  he'll  make  a 
good  husband." 

And  then,  with  quiet  grace,  she  left  the  room.  No 
one,  not  even  Belle,  whose  high  spirits  and  love  of 
life  had  led  her  into  many  perfectly  harmless  adven- 
tures when  she  was  the  same  age,  suspected  that  Ethel 
was  up  to  anything.  They  were  wrong.  The  self- 
constituted  invalid  had  invented  anaemia  for  two  very 
good  reasons.  First,  because  she  was  not  going  to 
be  deprived  of  welcoming  her  big  brother  when  he 
returned  home  for  good,  school  or  no  school,  and 
second  because  she  had  struck  up  a  surreptitious  ac- 
quaintance with  the  good-looking  boy  next  door.  At 
present  it  had  gone  no  further  than  the  daily  exchange 
of  letters  and  telephone  calls.  The  adventure  was  in 
the  course,  however,  of  speedy  development.  The 
boy  was  going  to  pay  her  a  visit  that  evening,  by  way 


THE  CITY  119 

of  the  roof.  No  wonder  Ethel  didn't  want  to  be 
disturbed. 

With  an  unwonted  burst  of  extravagance  Betty  took 
a  taxi  home  as  soon  after  dinner  as  she  could  get  away. 
"  Is  there  a  letter  for  me  ?  Is  there  a  letter  for  me  ?  " 
she  asked  the  moon  and  all  the  stars  in  the  clear  sky 
as  her  rackety  cab  bowled  swiftly  downtown. 

She  let  herself  in  and  the  first  thing  that  caught  her 
eyes  was  the  welcome  sight  of  a  thick  envelope  ad- 
dressed in  Peter's  big  round,  honest,  unaffected  hand. 

"  Peter,  oh,  my  Peter ! "  she  whispered,  pressing 
the  letter  to  her  lips. 

Within  five  minutes  she  was  sitting  on  her  bed,  in 
the  seclusion  of  her  own  room,  and  what  Peter  had 
to  say  for  himself  was  this: 

"  Carlton  Hotel,  London, 

"  September  28,  1913. 
"  My  dearest  Betty : 

"  Gee !  but  I  was  mighty  glad  to  find  a  letter  from  you 
this  afternoon  when  I  got  in,  so  glad  that  I  dashed  out  of 
this  Hotel,  went  across  the  street  to  the  White  Star  offices 
and  asked  them  to  exchange  my  bookings  to  a  boat  sailing 
a  week  earlier,  because  I  just  can't  stand  being  away 
from  you  any  longer.  I  don't  know  what  Nick  will  say, 
and  don't  much  care.  He's  at  Newmarket  staying  with  a 
man  who  trains  horses.  I've  just  sent  him  a  telegram  to 
say  what  I've  done,  and  as  he's  very  keen  to  see  New  York 
and  is  only  killing  time,  I  don't  think  he'll  kick  up  a  row. 
I  would  have  sailed  on  the  Olympic,  which  left  the  day 
after  I  said  good-bye  to  Thrapstone-Wynyates,  if  I  hadn't 
promised  father  to  go  up  to  Scotland  and  see  the  place 
where  his  ancestors  lived.  I  couldn't  back  out  of  that, 


120        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

especially  as  goodness  only  knows  when  I  shall  come  to 
Europe  again, —  perhaps  not  until  I  bring  you  over  on  a 
honeymoon,  my  baby,  and  we  go  back  to  Oxford  together 
to  see  how  the  fairy  ring  is  getting  on.  We  must  do  that 
some  day.  You  don't  know  how  I  love  that  little  open 
space  where  the  trees  haven't  grown  so  that  the  moon 
may  spill  itself  in  a  big  patch  for  all  our  friends  to  dance 
in  on  fine  nights.  I've  read  your  letter  a  dozen  times  and 
know  it  by  heart,  like  all  the  others  you've  written  to  me. 
You  write  the  most  wonderful  letters,  darling.  I  wish 
I  knew  how  to  send  you  something  worth  reading,  though 
I'm  quite  sure  you  don't  mind  my  clumsy  way  of  putting 
things  down,  because  you  know  how  much  I  love  you 
and  because  everything  I  say  comes  straight  out  of  my 
heart. 

"  My  last  letter  was  written  in  Scotland,  Cupar  Fife. 
I  shall  always  remember  that  quiet  little  place  where  the 
red-headed  Guthries, —  they  must  have  been  red-headed 
from  eating  so  much  porridge, —  tilled  the  earth  and 
brought  up  sheep  in  the  way  they  should  go.  The  vil- 
lage seems  as  much  cut  off  from  the  rest  of  the  world 
as  though  it  were  surrounded  by  sea,  and  every  small 
thing  that  happens  excites  it.  The  man  who  kept  the  Inn 
that  I  stayed  in  (feeling  frightfully  lonely,  though  really 
very  much  interested)  had  words  with  his  good  woman 
one  night  and  the  rights  and  wrongs  of  the  perfectly 
private  matter  have  since  divided  all  the  inhabitants. 
Best  friends  don't  speak  and  the  minister  is  going  to 
preach  about  the  affair  next  Sunday.  I  saw  the  house 
the  old  Guthries  lived  in  and  was  taken  all  over  it  by  a 
kind  old  soul  to  whom  father  gave  more  money  than  she 
thought  existed  when  he  was  there.  Gee !  but  my  great- 
grandfather must  have  had  precious  little  ambition  to  live 
his  whole  life  in  a  little  hole  like  that.  In  most  of  the 


THE  CITY  121 

rooms  the  beds  were  in  small  alcoves  and  needed  climbing 
up  to  like  bunks.  Mrs.  McAlister,  who  lives  there  now 
with  her  married  daughter  and  her  seven  children,  sleeps 
in  one  of  these  fug-holes  in  the  kitchen.  Think  of  it! 
And  she  said  that  the  floor  swarms  with  beetles  —  she  can 
hear  them  crackling  about  in  the  night.  All  the  same,  by 
Jove !  this  primitive  living  makes  men.  I  can  see  from 
whom  father  got  his  grit  and  determination. 

"  I  was  glad  to  find  myself  in  London.  I've  only  been 
here  for  a  night  or  two  at  various  times  and  it's  a  wilder- 
ness to  me.  I  lose  myself  every  time  I  go  out  and  have 
to  ask  Bobbies  how  to  get  back.  Topping  chaps,  these 
Bobbies.  They  mostly  look  like  gentlemen  and  are  aw- 
fully glad  to  get  a  laugh.  To  hear  them  talk  about  the 
'Aymarket,  Piccadilly  Surcuss,  Wart'loo  Plaice  and  West- 
minister Habbey  first  of  all  puzzles  one  and  then  fills 
one  with  joy.  As  to  the  Abbey, —  oh,  Gee !  but  isn't  it 
away  beyond  words!  I  spent  a  whole  day  wandering 
about  among  the  graves  of  its  mighty  dead,  and  finally 
when  I  got  to  the  end  of  the  cloister  and  came  upon  that 
small,  square,  open  space  where  the  grass  grows  so  green 
and  sparrows  play  about,  I  was  glad  there  was  nobody  to 
see  me  except  the  maid-servant  of  one  of  the  minor 
Canons  who  was  taking  in  the  milk  for  afternoon  tea. 
There  are  one  or  two  vacant  niches  among  the  shrines 
of  men  who  have  done  things  and  moved  things  on,  in 
which  I  should  like  to  stand  (not  looking  a  bit  like  my- 
self in  stone)  when  I  have  done  my  job,  and  if  I  were 
an  Englishman  I  should  work  for  it.  As  it  is,  I  shall 
work  for  you  and  all  you  mean  to  me,  my  baby,  and 
that's  even  a  higher  privilege. 

"  I  went  to  a  theatre  last  night, —  Wyndham's.  I 
thought  the  play  was  corking,  but  the  leading  actor  — -  an 
ugly  good-looking  fellow  —  wasn't  trying  a  yard,  and  let 


122        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

it  away  down  every  time  he  was  on.  Also  he  spent  his 
time  making  jokes  under  his  breath  to  the  other  people  to 
dry  them  up.  No  wonder  the  theatres  are  in  a  bad  way 
in  London.  There's  no  snap  and  ginger  about  the  shows 
except  the  ones  of  the  variety  theatres,  where  they  really 
do  take  off  their  coats  for  business.  It's  fine  to  hear  rag- 
times at  these  places,  although  they're  as  stale  on  our  side 
as  if  they  had  been  played  away  back  before  the  great 
wind.  By  the  way,  I'm  a  bit  anxious  about  Graham. 
His  letters  have  a  queer  undercurrent  in  them. 

"  I'm  going  to  the  National  Gallery,  the  British  Mu- 
seum and  South  Kensington  to-morrow,  and  in  the  even- 
ing I'm  dining  at  the  Trocadero  with  eight  men  who 
were  up  at  St.  John's  with  me.  They're  all  working  in 
London  and  hate  it,  after  Oxford.  It  seems  odd  to  me 
not  to  be  there  myself  and  I  miss  it  mighty  badly  some- 
times. All  the  same  it's  great  to  feel  that  one's  a  man  at 
last,  with  real  work  to  do  and  that  apartment  waiting  for 
us  to  win.  This  is  the  last  mail  that  I  can  catch  before 
sailing  and  so  I  just  have  to  tell  you  once  again,  in  case 
you  forget  it,  that  I  adore  you  and  that  if  I  don't  see  you 
on  the  landing  in  little  old  New  York  among  the  crowd 
I  shall  sink  away  like  an  India-rubber  balloon  with  a  pin 
in  it.  So  long,  my  dearest  girl.  All,  all  my  love,  now 
and  forever.  "  PETER." 

"  P.  S.  Do  you  think  your  father  can  be  brought  to 
like  me  somehow  or  other? 

"  Kiss  this  exact  spot." 


II 

A  GOOD  sport!     Oh,  yes,  Graham  answered  admir- 
ably to  that  description, —  according  to  its  present-day 


THE  CITY  123 

use.  Graham,  like  Belle,  was  suffering  from  the  fact 
that  everything  was  too  easy.  His  father's  so-called 
benefactor  had  taken  all  the  sting  of  life  for  that  boy. 
Fundamentally  he  had  inherited  a  considerable  amount 
of  his  father's  grit.  He  needed  the  impetus  of  strug- 
gle to  use  up  that  sense  of  adventure  which  was  deep- 
rooted  in  his  nature.  He  was  a  throw-back.  He  had 
all  the  stuff  in  him  that  was  in  his  ancestors, —  those 
early  pioneers  who  were  momentarily  up  against  the 
grim  facts  of  life.  He  was  not  cut  out  for  civiliza- 
tion. He  needed  action,  the  physical  strain  and  stress 
of  hunting  for  his  food  among  primeval  surroundings 
and  the  constant  exercise  of  his  strength  in  dangerous 
positions.  He  would  have  made  a  fine  sailor,  a  reck- 
less soldier  or  an  excellent  flying  man.  He  was  as 
much  out  of  his  element  in  Wall  Street  as  a  sporting 
dog  which  is  doomed  to  pass  away  its  life  sitting  be- 
side a  chauffeur  in  an  elaborate  motor-car.  The 
daring  recklessness  which  would  have  been  an  asset 
to  him  as  a  hunter  of  big  game  or  a  man  who  attached 
himself  to  dangerous  expeditions,  found  vent,  in  the 
heart  of  civilization,  in  gambling  and  running  wild. 
It  was  a  pity  to  see  such  a  lad  so  utterly  misplaced  and 
going  to  the  devil  with  an  alacrity  that  alarmed  even 
some  of  his  very  loose  friends.  If  his  father  had  con- 
tinued to  be  a  hard-working  doctor  whose  income  was 
barely  large  enough  to  cover  his  yearly  expenses, 
Graham  could  have  used  up  his  superabundant  ener- 
gies in  climbing,  rung  by  rung,  any  ladder  at  the 
bottom  of  which  he  had  been  placed.  As  it  was,  he 
found  himself,  through  his  father's  sudden  accession 


124        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

to  wealth,  beginning  where  most  men  leave  off,  with 
nothing  to  fight  for  —  nothing  to  put  his  teeth  into 
—  nothing  for  which  to  take  off  his  coat.  It  was 
all  wrong.  He  made  money  and  lost  it  with  equal 
ease  —  although  he  lost  more  than  he  won.  He  was 
surrounded  with  luxuries  when  he  should  have  been 
faced  daily  with  the  splendid  difficulties  which  go  to 
form  character  and  mental  strength.  Somehow  or 
other  his  innate  desire  for  adventure  had  to  be  used 
up.  With  no  one  to  exercise  any  discipline  over  him, 
with  no  steady  hand  to  guide  him  and  control,  he  flung 
himself  headlong  into  the  vortex  of  the  night  life  of 
the  great  city  and  was  an  easy  prey  for  its  rastaquores. 
At  the  age  of  twenty- four  he  already  knew  what  it 
was  to  be  haunted  by  money-lenders.  Already  he  was 
up  to  the  innumerable  dodges  of  the  men  who  borrow 
from  Peter  to  pay  Paul.  He  was  a  well-known  figure 
in  gambling  clubs  and  the  houses  in  the  red-light  dis- 
trict, and  he  numbered  among  his  friends  men  and 
women  who  made  a  specialty  of  dealing  with  boys  of 
his  type  and  who  laid  their  nets  with  consummate 
knowledge  of  humanity  and  with  the  most  dastardly 
callousness.  He  was  indeed,  in  the  usual  inaccurate 
conception  of  the  word,  a  good  "  sport,"  and  stood 
every  chance  of  paying  for  the  privilege  with  his 
health,  his  self-respect  and  the  whole  of  his  future 
life. 

To  have  seen  the  nervous  way  in  which  he  dressed 
for  dinner  the  next  evening,  throwing  tie  after  tie 
away  with  irritable  cursing,  would  have  convinced  the 
most  casual  observer  of  the  fact  that  he  stood  in  need 


THE  CITY  125 

of  a  strong  hand.  His  very  appearance, —  the  dark 
lines  round  his  eyes,  the  unsteadiness  of  his  hand, — 
denoted  plainly  enough  the  sort  of  life  that  he  was 
leading,  but  the  short-sighted  eyes  of  the  Doctor  in 
whose  house  he  lived  missed  all  this,  and  there  was 
no  one  except  the  little  mother  to  cry  "  halt "  to  this 
poor  lad  and,  in  her  experience,  of  what  avail  was 
she? 

He  drove  —  after  having  dined  with  three  other 
Wall  Street  men  at  Sherry's  —  to  an  apartment  house 
on  West  Fortieth  Street,  little  imagining  that  fate  had 
determined  to  put  him  to  the  test.  Kenyon  had  rec- 
ommended him  to  try  it.  He  had  heard  of  it  from 
Captain  Fountain's  brother,  who  had  called  it  "  very 
hot  stuff  "  in  one  of  his  letters, —  the  headquarters 
of  a  so-called  "  Bohemian "  set  in  which  Art  and 
gambling  were  combined.  It  was  run  by  a  woman 
whose  name  was  Russian,  whose  instincts  were  cos- 
mopolitan, and  who  had  been  shifted  out  of  most  of 
the  great  European  cities  by  the  police.  "  The  Pa- 
powsky,"  as  she  was  called,  spoke  several  languages 
equally  fluently.  She  was  something  of  a  judge  of 
art.  She  had  an  uncanny  way  of  being  able  to  pre- 
dict success  or  failure  to  new  plays.  She  knew 
musicians  when  she  saw  them  and  only  had  to  smell  a 
book  to  know  whether  it  had  excellence  or  not.  Her 
short,  thin  body  and  yellow  skin,  her  black  hair  cut 
in  a  fringe  over  her  eyes  and  short  all  round  like  that 
of  a  Shakesperian  page,  her  long,  dark,  Oriental  eyes 
and  her  long  artistic  hands  were  in  themselves  far 
from  attractive.  It  was  her  wit  and  sarcasm  how- 


126        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ever  and  the  brilliant  way  in  which  she  summed  up 
people  and  things  which  made  her  the  leader  of  those 
odd  people  —  to  be  found  in  every  great  city  —  who 
delight  in  being  unconventional  and  find  excitement  in 
a  game  of  chance. 

The  apartment  in  which  she  held  her  "  receptions  " 
and  entertainments  was  unique.  The  principal  room 
was  a  large  and  lofty  studio,  arranged  like  a  grotto 
with  rocks  and  curious  lights  and  secluded  places 
where  there  were  divans.  Here  there  was  a  dais,  at 
the  back  of  which  there  was  an  organ,  and  a  grand 
piano  stood  upon  it  in  a  French  frame  all  over  cupids, 
and  it  was  here  that  the  most  extraordinary  exhibi- 
tions of  dancing  were  given  by  the  Papowsky  hand- 
maidens and  others. 

The  other  people  who  lived  in  this  apartment  house 
had  already  begun  to  talk  about  it  in  whispers,  and 
its  reputation  had  gone  out  into  the  city.  One  or  two 
feeble  complaints  had  been  made  to  the  police,  but 
without  any  avail.  At  the  moment  when  Graham  had 
first  entered  it,  it  was  in  its  second  year  and  was  flour- 
ishing like  the  proverbial  Bay  Tree.  The  magnets 
which  drew  him  to  this  house  of  Arabian  Nights  were 
the  roulette  table  in  a  secluded  room  at  the  end  of  the 
passage,  and  one  of  the  hand-maidens  of  the  Papow- 
sky, whose  large,  gazelle-like  eyes  and  soft  caressing 
hands  drew  him  from  other  haunts,  and  followed  him 
into  his  dreams. 


THE  CITY  127 


III 

GRAHAM'S  hat  and  coat  were  taken  by  a  Japanese 
servant,  whose  little  eyes  twinkled  a  welcome. 

The  long,  brilliantly  lighted  passage  which  led  to 
the  studio  was  hung  with  nudes,  some  of  them  painted 
in  oils  with  a  sure  touch,  some  highly  finished  in  black- 
and-white,  and  the  rest  dashed  off  in  chalks, —  rough 
impressionist  things  which  might  have  been  drawn  by 
art  students  under  the  influence  of  drink.  Between 
them  in  narrow  black  frames  there  was  a  collection  of 
diabolically  clever  caricatures  of  well-known  singers, 
actors,  authors,  painters  and  politicians,  each  one 
bringing  out  the  weaknesses  of  the  victims  with 
peculiar  impishness  and  insight.  The  floor  of  the  pas- 
sage was  covered  with  a  thick  black  pile  carpet,  which 
smothered  all  noise. 

As  Graham  entered  the  studio  several  strange  minor 
chords  were  struck  on  the  piano  and  a  woman's  deep 
contralto  voice  filled  the  large  studio  like  winter  wind 
moaning  through  an  old  chimney. 

The  Papowsky,  who  was  giving  an  evening  for 
young  artists,  and  was  half-covered  in  a  more  than 
usually  grotesque  garment,  slid  out  of  the  shadow  and 
gave  Graham  her  left  hand,  murmuring  a  welcome. 
Exuding  a  curious  pungent  aroma,  she  placed  a  long 
finger  on  her  red,  thin  lips  and  slipped  away  again. 
For  some  minutes  Graham  remained  where  she  left 
him,  trying  to  accustom  his  eyes  to  the  dim  —  though 
far  from  religious  —  light.  He  made  out  men  in 


128        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

dress  clothes  sitting  here  and  there  and  the  glint  of 
nymph-like  forms  passing  from  place  to  place,  spring- 
ily.  The  scent  of  cigarette  smoke  mixed  with  that  of 
some  queer  intoxicating  perfume.  The  sound  of 
water  plashing  from  a  fountain  came  to  his  ears. 

On  his  way  to  find  a  seat,  Graham's  arm  was  sud- 
denly seized,  he  was  pulled  into  a  corner  and  found 
himself,  gladly  enough,  alone  with  the  girl  who  called 
herself  Ita  Strabosck.  There  was  one  blue  light  in 
this  alcove  and  by  it  he  could  see  that  the  girl  was 
dressed  like  an  Apache  in  black  suit  with  trousers 
which  belled  out  over  her  little  ankles  and  fitted  her 
tightly  everywhere  else.  She  retained  her  close  grip 
and  began  to  whisper  eagerly  to  him.  Her  foreign  ac- 
cent was  more  marked  than  usual,  owing  to  the  emo- 
tion under  which  she  obviously  labored.  Her  heart 
hammered  against  his  arm. 

"  You  have  come  to  zee  me  ?  " 

Graham  whispered  back.  "  Don't  I  always  come 
to  see  you  ?  " 

"You  like  me?" 

Graham  bent  forward  and  kissed  her  mouth. 

"You  love  me?" 

The  boy  laughed. 

"  S-s-s-h !  Eef  you  love  me,  eef  you  really  and 
truly  love  me,  I  vill  to-night  ask  you  to  prove 
eet." 

"  I've  been  waiting,"  said  Graham,  with  a  sudden 
touch  of  passion. 

"  Zen  take  me  avay  from  this  'ell.  I  'ave  a  soul. 
Eet  ees  killing  me.  I  'ave  a  longing  for  God's  air. 


THE  CITY  129 

Take  me  back  to  eet.  The  Papowsky  ees  a  vile 
woman.  She  lure  me  'ere  and  I  am  a  prisoner.  You 
do  not  know  the  'errors  of  zis  place.  I  am  young. 
I  am  almost  a  child.  I  was  good  and  I  can  be  good 
again.  At  once,  when  you  come  'ere,  I  saw  in  you 
one  who  might  rescue  me  from  zis.  I  love  you.  You 
say  you  love  me.  I  beseech  you  to  take  me  away." 

Graham  was  stirred  by  this  emotional  appeal  whis- 
pered in  his  ear,  by  the  young  arms  that  were  flung 
round  his  neck,  and  by  the  little  body  that  was  all  soft 
against  him.  His  sense  of  chivalry  and  his  innate 
desire  for  adventure  were  instantly  set  ablaze.  At  the 
same  time,  what  could  he  do  with  this  strange  little 
girl  ?  Where  could  he  put  her  ? 

He  began  to  whisper  back  something  of  his  inabil- 
ity to  help,  but  a  hand  was  quickly  placed  over  his 
mouth. 

"  Eef  you  believe  in  God,  take  me  away.  I  do  not 
care  what  you  do  with  me.  I  do  not  care  eef  you 
make  me  work  for  my  bread.  You  are  not  like  ze 
rest.  You  too  are  young  and  you  are  a  man,  and  I 
love  you.  I  will  be  your  servant  —  your  slave.  I 
will  kiss  your  feet.  I  will  give  you  myself.  I  will 
wait  on  you  'and  and  foot.  Give  me  a  little  room  near 
ze  sky  and  see  me  once  a  day,  but  take  me  out  of  this 
evil  place  —  I  am  being  poisoned.  Vill  you  do  zis  ? 
Vill  you  ? "  She  slipped  down  on  her  knees  and 
clasped  her  hands  together. 

In  the  faint  blue  light  Graham  could  see  the  large 
eyes  of  the  girl  looking  up  at  him  through  tears,  as 
though  to  a  saviour.  Her  whole  attitude  was  one  of 


I3o        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

great  appeal.  Her  young,  slim  body  trembled  and  the 
throbbing  of  her  voice  with  its  curious  foreign  accent 
moved  him  to  an  overwhelming  pity.  Here  then  was 
something  that  he  could  do  —  was  a  way  in  which  he 
could  exercise  his  bottled  up  sense  of  adventure  which 
had  hitherto  only  been  kept  in  some  sort  of  control 
by  gambling  and  running  risks. 

"  Do  you  mean  that  you're  forced  to  remain  here, 

—  that  you  can't  get  out  if  you  want  to?  " 

"  Yes,  yes,  yes !  I  tell  you  I  was  caught  like  a 
wild  bird  and  zis  ees  my  cage.  Ze  door  ees  guarded." 

A  great  excitement  seized  the  boy.  He  lifted  Ita 
up  and  put  his  mouth  to  her  ear.  "  You've  come  to 
the  right  man.  I'll  get  you  out  of  this.  I  always 
loathed  to  see  you  here, —  but  how's  it  to  be  done? 
She  has  eyes  in  the  back  of  her  head,  and  those 
damned  Japanese  servants  are  everywhere." 

"  Eeet  ees  for  you  to  sink,"  said  the  girl.  "  You 
are  a  man." 

"  I  see,"  said  Graham.  "  Right.  Leave  it  to 
me." 

He  liked  being  made  responsible.  He  liked  the 
utter  trust  which  this  girl  placed  in  him.  He  liked 
the  feeling  of  danger.  The  whole  episode  and  its 
uncanny  romance  caught  hold  of  him.  It  was  not 
every  day  that  in  the  middle  of  civilization  the  chance 
came  to  do  something  which  smacked  of  mediaevalism 

—  which  had  in  it  something  of  the  high  adventure 
of  Ivanhoe. 

He  said :  "  Get  away  quick  and  put  your  clothes 
on.  Don't  pack  anything  —  just  dress.  There  won't 


THE  CITY  131 

be  any  one  in  the  roulette  room  until  after  twelve. 
Go  in  there  and  hide  behind  the  curtains  and  wait  for 
me.  Quick,  now !  " 

Once  more  the  girl  flung  her  arms  about  him  and 
put  her  lips  to  his  mouth. 

For  several  minutes  Graham  remained  alone  in  the 
alcove,  with  his  blood  running  swiftly  through  his 
veins  —  his  brain  hard  at  work.  The  woman  on  the 
dais  was  still  singing.  In  the  vague,  uncertain  light 
he  could  see  the  Papowsky  curled  up  on  a  divan  near 
by,  smoking  a  cigarette.  Other  people  had  come  in 
and  made  groups  among  the  foolish  rockery.  Then 
he  got  up  quietly,  went  out  into  the  passage  and  looked 
about.  He  had  never  before  explored  the  place,  he 
only  knew  the  studio  and  the  roulette  room.  It 
dawned  upon  him  that  this  apartment  was  just  be- 
neath the  roof  of  the  building.  Somewhere  or  other 
there  was  likely  to  be  an  outlet  to  the  fire-escape. 
That  was  the  idea.  He  had  it.  The  girl  had  said 
that  it  would  be  impossible  to  take  her  away  by  the 
main  door.  Those  Japanese  servants  were  evidently 
watch-dogs.  Even  as  he  stood  there,  wondering,  he 
saw  that  he  was  eyed  by  a  small,  square-shouldered 
Japanese  whose  head  seemed  to  be  too  large  for  his 
body  and  whose  oily  deferential  grin  was  not  to  be 
trusted.  He  lit  a  cigarette,  and  putting  on  what  he 
considered  to  be  an  air  of  extreme  nonchalance, 
strolled  along  until  he  came  to  the  roulette  room.  No 
one  was  there.  The  candelabra  were  onlj  partially 
alight.  He  darted  quickly  to  the  window  and  flung 
it  up.  The  iron  steps  of  the  fire-escape  ran  past  it 


132 

to  the  roof.  "  Fine !  "  he  said  to  himself.  "  Now  I 
know  what  to  do." 

He  shut  the  window  quickly  and  turned  round  just 
as  the  man  who  had  been  watching  him  came  in. 
"  Say !  "  he  said.  "  Just  go  and  get  me  a  high-ball. 
Bring  it  here."  He  followed  the  man  to  the  door  and 
into  the  passage  and  watched  him  waddle  away.  He 
had  not  been  there  more  than  a  moment  when  the  door 
opposite  opened  bit  by  bit,  and  the  girl's  face,  with 
large  frightened  eyes,  peeped  round  the  corner.  In 
a  little  black  hat  and  a  plain  frock  with  a  very  tight 
skirt  she  looked  younger  and  prettier  and  more  in  need 
of  help  than  ever.  Without  a  word,  Graham  caught 
hold  of  her  hand,  drew  her  into  the  passage,  shut  her 
door,  ran  her  into  the  roulette  room  and  placed  her 
behind  the  curtains,  making  sure  that  her  feet  were 
hidden.  Whistling  softly  to  himself  he  sat  down  and 
waited.  The  man  seemed  to  have  been  gone  half  an 
hour.  It  was  really  only  a  few  minutes  before  he 
waddled  back  on  his  heels.  Graham  took  the  drink. 
"  How  soon  do  you  think  they'll  begin  to  play  to- 
night ?  "  he  asked,  keeping  his  voice  steady  with  a 
huge  effort. 

The  Japanese  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  As  usual, 
sir,"  he  said,  smiling  from  ear  to  ear  and  rubbing  his 
hands  together  as  though  he  were  washing  them. 
"Any  time  after  twelve,  sir  —  any  time,  sir." 

"All  right!"  said  Graham.     "I  shall  wait  here." 

He  kept  up  the  air  of  boredom  until  he  imagined 
that  the  small,  black-haired,  olive-tinted  man  had  had 
time  to  get  well  away.  Then  he  sprang  to  the  door, 


THE  CITY  133 

saw  that  the  passage  was  empty,  darted  back  into  the 
room  and  over  to  the  window. 

"  Come  on !  "  he  said.  "  Quick's  the  word !  "  and 
climbed  out,  giving  the  girl  his  hand.  For  a  moment 
they  stood  together  on  the  ledge  of  the  fire-escape,  the 
stairs  of  which  seemed  to  run  endlessly  down.  With 
a  chuckle  of  triumph  Graham  shut  the  window,  as 
the  girl  gave  a  little  cry  of  dismay. 

She  had  called  that  place  hell,  but  from  the  height 
on  which  they  stood  it  seemed  as  though  they  were 
climbing  down  from  the  sky. 


IV 

"  UPTOWN,"  said  Graham  to  the  taxi  driver.  "  I'll 
tell  you  where  when  I  know  myself." 

A  knowing  and  sympathetic  grin  covered  the  big 
Irish  face  and  a  raucous  yell  came  from  the  hard-used 
engine,  and  the  taxi  went  forward  with  a  huge 
jerk. 

The  little  girl  turned  her  large  eyes  on  Graham. 
"  You  do  not  know  vhere  you  take  me  ? "  she 
asked. 

"  No,  by  thunder,  I  don't.  I  can't  drive  you  like 
this  to  a  hotel,  you've  got  no  baggage.  Most  of  my 
friends  live  in  bachelor  apartments,  and  the  women  I 
know, —  well,  I  would  like  to  see  their  faces  if  I  turned 
up  with  you  —  and  this  story." 

The  girl's  foreign  gesture  was  eloquent  of  despair. 
She  heaved  a  deep  sigh  and  drew  into  the  corner  of 


i34        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

the  cab.  The  passing  lights  shone  intermittently  on 
her  little  white  face.  How  small  and  pitiful  and  help- 
less she  looked. 

The  sight  of  her  set  Graham's  brain  working  again. 
In  getting  her  out  of  the  Papowsky's  poisonous  place 
and  leading  her  step  by  step  down  the  winding  fire- 
escape  and,  when  it  ceased  abruptly  in  mid-air,  into 
the  window  of  a  restaurant,  he  had  been  brought  to 
the  end  of  one  line  of  thought, —  that  of  getting  the 
girl  safely  out  of  her  prison.  He  now  started  on 
another,  while  the  cab  rocked  along  the  trolley  lines 
beneath  the  elevated  railway,  sometimes  swerving 
dangerously  out  and  round  the  iron  sup'ports. 

Suddenly  Graham  was  seized  with  an  idea.  He  put 
his  head  out  of  the  cab  window  and  shouted  to  the 
driver:  "Fifty-five  East  Fifty-second  Street." 

The  girl  turned  to  him  hopefully.  "  What  ees 
zat?"  she  asked. 

"  My  home." 

"  Your  'ome  ?    You  take  me  to  your  'ome  ?  " 

"  Why  no,  not  exactly.  I'm  going  in  to  get  a  bag 
for  you.  It  won't  have  much  in  it  except  a  brush  and 
comb  and  a  pair  of  my  pajamas,  but  with  them  we 
can  drive  to  any  quiet  hotel  and  I'll  get  a  room  for 
you.  In  the  morning  I'll  find  a  little  furnished  apart- 
ment and  you  can  go  out  and  buy  some  clothes  and 
the  other  things  that  you  need.  How's  that  ?  " 

Ita  caught  up  his  hand  and  held  it  against  her  heart. 
"  But  you  are  not  going  to  leave  me?  " 

"  Yes,  I  must,"  said  Graham.  "  I  shall  have  to 
register  you  as  my  sister.  You've  just  come  off  the 


THE  CITY  135 

train  and  I've  met  you  at  the  station.  Oh,  don't  cry ! 
It's  the  best  I  can  do.  It's  only  just  for  one  night. 
I'll  fix  things  to-morrow  and  you'll  be  very  happy  in 
a  little  apartment  of  your  own,  won't  you?  I'll  see 
you  every  day  there." 

With  a  sudden  and  almost  painfully  touching  aban- 
don of  gratitude  the  girl  flung  herself  on  the  floor  of 
the  cab  and  put  her  head  on  Graham's  knees,  calling 
on  God  to  bless  him.  Something  came  into  the  boy's 
throat. 

The  taxi  crossed  Fifth  Avenue  behind  a  motor-car 
that  was  also  going  towards  Madison  Avenue.  It 
looked  very  familiar  to  Graham.  Supposing  it  was 
his  father  returning  from  one  of  his  medical  meetings ! 
He  put  his  head  out  again,  sharply :  "  Stop  at  the  first 
house  on  East  Fifty-second  Street!"  he  shouted. 
Almost  before  the  cab  had  stopped  he  leaped  out. 
"  Wait  for  me  here,"  he  added. 

"  Sure  an'  I  will."  The  driver  threw  a  glance  at 
his  taxi-meter.  Not  for  him  to  care  how  long  he 
waited. 

Graham  darted  along  the  street  and  up  the  steps 
of  Number  fifty-five,  and  just  as  he  had  the  key  in  the 
door  he  heard  his  father's  voice. 

"  No,  no.  Let  my  car  take  you  home.  Yes,  a 
wonderful  evening.  Most  inspiring.  Good  night! 
Let's  meet  again  soon !  " 

Graham  made  up  his  mind  what  to  do.  He  held 
the  door  open  for  the  Doctor  and  stood  waiting  for 
him,  with  the  bored  look  of  one  who  has  had  a  rather 
dull  evening. 


136        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Oh,  thank  you,  Graham,"  said  Dr.  Guthrie. 
"  Have  you  just  got  back?  " 

"  Yes ;  I  thought  I'd  get  to  bed  early  to-night." 

"  You  look  as  though  you  needed  sleep,"  said  the 
Doctor.  "  But  —  but  don't  go  up  at  once.  Please 
come  and  have  a  cigarette  in  my  room.  I've  —  I've 
been  speaking  at  the  Academy  of  Medicine, —  explain- 
ing a  new  discovery.  A  great  triumph,  Graham,  a 
great  triumph.  I  would  like  to  tell  one  of  my  sons 
about  it.  Won't  you  come  ?  " 

There  was  an  unwonted  look  of  excitement  on  his 
father's  thin  face  and  a  ring  in  his  voice  which  made 
it  almost  youthful.  It  was  the  first  time  that  Graham 
had  ever  received  such  an  invitation.  He  was  sur- 
prised, and  if  he  had  not  been  so  desperately  anxious 
to  slip  up-stairs,  lay  quick  hands  on  the  bag  and  get 
away  again  he  would  have  accepted  it  gladly.  For 
a  reason  that  he  could  not  explain  he  felt  at  that 
instant  an  almost  unbearable  desire  to  find  his  father, 
to  get  in  touch  with  him,  to  give  something  and  re- 
ceive something  that  he  seemed  to  yearn  for  and  need 
more  urgently  than  at  any  other  moment  in  his  life. 
As  it  was,  he  was  obliged  to  back  out.  "  I'm  fright- 
fully tired  to-night,"  he  said,  yawning. 

"Oh,  are  you?  I'm  sorry,"  said  the  Doctor 
apologetically.  "  Some  other  night  perhaps  —  some 
other  night." 

The  two  men  stood  facing  each  other  uncomfort- 
ably. Exhilaration  had  for  a  moment  broken  down 
the  Doctor's  shyness.  It  all  came  back  to  him  when 
he  found  his  son's  eyes  upon  him  like  those  of  a 


THE  CITY  137 

stranger.  He  took  off  his  coat  and  hat,  said  "  Good- 
night "  nervously  and  went  quickly  across  the  hall  and 
into  his  library. 

He  was  deeply  hurt.  He  stood  among  those  price- 
less books  with  a  curious  pain  running  through  his 
veins.  "  What's  the  matter  with  me  ?  "  he  asked  him- 
self. "  Why  do  I  chill  my  children  and  make  them 
draw  back?  " 

Graham  shut  the  door,  and  then  as  quickly  as  an 
eel  ran  up-stairs  to  his  bedroom,  turned  on  the  light, 
opened  the  door  of  the  closet  and  pulled  out  a  large 
suit-case.  Then  he  began  to  hunt  among  the  drawers 
of  his  wardrobe  for  some  pajamas.  He  threw  these 
in.  From  his  bathroom  he  caught  up  a  brush  and 
comb  and  some  bedroom  slippers.  These  followed 
the  pajamas.  Then  he  shut  the  case,  picked  it  up, 
crept  quietly  down-stairs,  across  the  hall  and  out  into 
the  street,  shutting  the  door  softly  behind  him.  He 
gave  the  taxi-driver  the  name  of  a  small  hotel  fre- 
quented by  actors,  and  jumped  into  the  cab. 

Ita  Strabosck  welcomed  him  as  though  he  had  been 
gone  a  week.  "  'Ow  good  you  are  to  me !  "  she  cried. 
"  Eef  you  never  do  anysing  else  een  your  life,  zis  that 
you  'ave  done  for  me  vill  be  written  down  by  zee 
angels  een  your  book." 

Graham  laughed.     "  The  angels  —  I  wonder." 

All  the  same  he  was  a  little  proud  of  himself.  Not 
many  men  would  have  perfected  the  rescue  of  this 
little  girl  so  neatly  from  a  house  in  which  her  body 
and  soul  were  in  jeopardy.  It  had  been  an  episode 
in  his  sophisticated  life  which  was  all  to  his  credit. 


138        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

He  felt  that, —  with  pleasure  liked  the  idea  of  being 
responsible  for  this  poor  little  soul,  of  having  some 
one  dependent  entirely  upon  his  generosity  and  who 
presently  would  wait  for  his  step  with  a  fluttering 
heart  and  run  to  meet  him  when  he  came  in  tired.  He 
liked  also  the  thought  that  this  girl  would  be  a  little 
secret  of  his  own, —  some  one  personal  to  himself,  to 
whom  he  could  take  his  worries  —  and  he  had  many 
—  and  get  sympathy  and  even  advice. 

The  cab  drew  up.  Graham  released  himself  from 
the  girl's  arms  and  led  her  into  the  small  and  rather 
fuggy  foyer  of  the  hotel,  which  was  a  stone's  throw 
from  Broadway.  A  colored  porter  pounced  upon  the 
bag  and  an  alert  clerk  looked  up  from  the  mail  that 
he  was  sorting. 

"  I  want  a  room  for  my  sister,"  said  Graham,  "  with 
bath.  Got  one  ?  " 

"  Fifth  floor,"  said  the  clerk,  after  gazing  fixedly 
for  a  moment  at  something  at  the  back  of  the  screen. 
He  then  pushed  the  book  towards  Graham. 

Without  a  moment's  hesitation,  Graham  wrote 
"  Miss  Nancy  Robertson,  Buffalo,"  and  took  the  key 
that  was  extended  to  him.  "  Come  on,  Nancy,"  he 
said,  and  led  the  way  to  the  elevator,  in  which  was 
waiting  a  tall,  florid  woman  carrying  a  small  bulldog 
in  her  arms.  She  had  obviously  not  taken  very  great 
pains  to  remove  the  make-up  from  her  face  which  had 
been  necessary  to  her  small  part.  Graham  recognized 
her  as  an  actress  whom  he  had  seen  some  nights 
before  in  an  English  play  at  the  Thirty-ninth  Street 
Theatre,  and  he  thought  how  queer  life  was  and  what 


THE  CITY  139 

odd  tricks  it  played.  Not  a  foot  away  from  each 
other  stood  two  women,  the  one  just  back  from  a  place 
in  which  she  had  been  aping  a  human  being  in  a  piece 
utterly  artificial  and  untrue,  the  other  who  had  played 
a  part  in  a  tragedy  of  grim  and  horrible  reality,  out 
of  which  she  had  been  carried  before  the  inevitable 
climax. 

The  colored  boy,  with  a  hospitable  grin  on  his  face, 
led  the  way  along  a  narrow,  shabby  passage  whose 
wall-paper  was  much  the  worse  for  wear,  and  finally 
opened  the  door  of  a  small  bedroom,  switching  on  the 
light. 

"  I'll  undo  the  case,"  said  Graham  quickly. 

The  boy  drew  back.     "  Sure." 

"And  say!  If  you'll  see  that  my  sister  gets  what 
she  rings  for  I'll  give  you  five  dollars." 

"  You  bet  your  life,  sah."  There  was  a  dazzling 
glint  of  white  teeth. 

"  Thanks." 

"  You  welcome." 

The  cry  of  joy  and  relief  which  made  the  whole 
room  quiver,  as  soon  as  the  porter  had  gone,  went 
straight  to  Graham's  heart  "  I  guess  it's  not  much 
of  a  room,"  he  said,  a  little  huskily,  "  but  we'll  change 
all  this  to-morrow." 

The  girl  ran  her  hand  over  the  pillow  and  the  bed- 
cover. "  Oh,  but  eet  ees  zo  sweet  and  clean,"  she 
said,  between  tears  and  laughter,  "  and  no  one  can 
come.  Eet  ees  mine.  You  are  zo,  20  good  to  me." 

Graham  undid  the  case  and  spilt  the  meagre  con- 
tents on  the  bed,  Then  he  put  his  hands  on  Ita'g 


140        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

shoulders  and  kissed  her.  "  Good-night,  you  poor 
little  thing,"  he  said.  "  Sleep  well,  order  anything 
that  you  want,  and  don't  leave  this  room  until  I  come 
and  fetch  you.  Your  troubles  are  over." 

She  clung  to  him.  "  But  you  vill  stay  a  leetle  — 
just  a  leetle?" 

"  No,  I'm  going  now." 

There  was  nowhere  in  Graham's  mind  the  remotest 
desire  to  stay.  A  new  and  strange  chivalry  had  taken 
the  place  of  the  passion  that  had  swept  over  him  earlier 
in  the  evening  when  the  blue  light  had  fallen  on  her 
slim  body. 

She  looked  into  his  face,  nodded  and  put  her  lips 
to  his  cheek.  "  Good  night,  zen,"  she  said.  "  You 
'ave  taken  me  out  of  hell.  You  are  very  good." 

And  as  Graham  walked  home  under  the  gleaming 
moon  and  the  star-bespattered  sky,  there  was  a  little 
queer  song  in  his  rather  lonely  heart. 

Poor,  simple,  sophisticated  lad!  How  easy  it  had 
been  for  that  cunning  little  creature  whose  one  ambi- 
tion was  to  be  the  mistress  of  an  apartment  in  business 
for  herself,  to  take  advantage  of  his  unfed  sense  of 
adventure.  She,  and  fate,  had  certainly  played  him 
a  very  impish  trick. 

V 

THE  Oceanic  had  been  timed  to  dock  at  four-thirty, 
but  the  thick  mist  at  the  mouth  of  the  Hudson  had 
caused  some  delay  and  her  mail  had  been  heavy.  The 
consequence  was  that  she  was  edged  in  to  her  dock 


THE  CITY  141 

considerably  more  than  an  hour  late,  to  be  welcomed 
by  an  outburst  of  long-expectant  handkerchiefs. 

During  the  period  of  waiting  —  by  no  means  un- 
pleasant, because  the  sun  fell  warmly  upon  the  won- 
derful river  —  several  brief,  emotional  conversations 
took  place  between  the  people  who  had  come  to  greet 
Peter.  The  Guthries  were  there  in  a  body, —  even 
Ethel  had  pulled  herself  together  and  had  come  to  be 
among  the  first  to  greet  her  favorite  brother.  Graham 
wouldn't  have  missed  the  occasion  for  anything  on 
earth.  His  love  for  Peter  was  deep  and  true.  And 
it  was  good  to  see  the  excitement  of  them  all  and  of 
the  little  mother,  who  was  in  a  state  of  verging  be- 
tween tears  and  laughter  all  the  time.  Her  big  boy 
was  coming  home  again  and  once  more  she  would 
have  the  ineffable  joy  of  tucking  him  up  at  night  some- 
times, and  asking  God  to  bless  him  before  she  drew 
the  clothes  about  his  ears  as  she  had  done  so  often. 
Even  the  Doctor  found  it  necessary  to  take  off  his 
glasses  several  times  and  rub  them  clear  of  the  mois- 
ture that  prevented  him  from  seeing  the  approaching 
vessel  which  seemed  to  have  given  herself  up  to  the 
bullying  of  the  small  but  energetic  tugs  whose  blunt 
noses  butted  into  her. 

Betty  brought  her  father;  and  these  two,  with  a 
delicacy  of  feeling  characteristic  of  them,  placed  them- 
selves among  the  crowd  away  from  the  Guthrie  fam- 
ily. Intuitively,  Betty  knew  that  much  as  Mrs. 
Guthrie  liked  her,  she  would  rather  resent  her  pres- 
ence there  at  such  a  moment.  Belle's  quick  eyes  very 
soon  discovered  them,  however,  and  presently  they 


i42        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

permitted   themselves   to   be   drawn   into   the    family 
group. 

It  was  a  curious  moment  for  Ranken  Townsend  and 
his  feelings  were  not  unlike  those  of  little  Mrs. 
Guthrie.  "  My  God !  "  he  said  to  himself  as  he  stood 
looking  out  at  the  wide  river,  its  marvellous  and 
strenuous  life  and  the  amazing  sky-line  of  the  build- 
ings on  the  opposite  bank ;  "  has  the  time  arrived 
already  for  me  to  lose  my  little  girl?  Am  I  so  old 
that  I  have  a  young  thing  ripe  enough  for  marriage 
and  to  bring  into  the  world  young  things  of  her 
own?  " 

The  artist  had  only  met  the  elder  Guthries  once  be- 
fore, although  Belle  was  a  particular  friend  of  his, 
having  been  frequently  brought  to  his  studio  by  Betty. 
He  knew  Peter  only  from  having  seen  him  in  the  treas- 
ured snapshots  which  his  little  daughter  brought  home 
with  her  from  Oxford.  He  had  to  confess  to  him- 
self—  although  his  natural  jealousy  made  him  unwill- 
ing to  do  so  —  that  Peter  looked  just  the  sort  of  man 
whom  he  would  like  his  daughter  to  marry  when  her 
time  came.  And  so  he  singled  out  Mrs.  Guthrie 
almost  at  once  and  drew  her  aside.  The  breeze  blew 
through  his  Viking  beard,  and  a  fellow-feeling 
brought  into  his  eyes  an  expression  of  sympathy  which 
immediately  warmed  Mrs.  Guthrie's  heart  towards 
him.  "  I  didn't  want  to  come  this  afternoon,  Mrs. 
Guthrie,"  he  said.  "  Shall  I  explain  why  ?  " 

"  No,"  said  the  little  mother.  "  I  quite  under- 
stand." 

'  Your  boy  and  my  girl  are  following  the  inevitable 


THE  CITY  143 

laws  of  nature,  and  it's  rather  hard  luck  for  us  both, 
isn't  it?" 

Mrs.  Guthrie  put  her  handkerchief  up  to  her  mouth 
and  nodded. 

"  Betty's  a  good  girl  and  I've  only  to  look  at  you  to 
know  that  the  man  to  whom  she's  given  her  heart  is 
a  fine  fellow.  Well,  it  brings  us  up  to  another  mile- 
stone, doesn't  it?  —  one  that  I  wish  was  still  some 
years  ahead.  However,  let's  face  it  with  pluck  and 
with  unselfishness,  and  be  friends.  Shall  we?" 

"  Please,"  said  the  little  mother,  giving  him  her 
hand. 

Ranken  Townsend  bared  his  head. 

And  then  Dr.  Guthrie  came  up  and  peered  at  the 
man  who  was  talking  to  his  wife.  He  vaguely  re- 
membered the  artist's  picturesque  appearance  and  fine 
open  face,  but  he  had  forgotten  his  name. 

Mrs.  Guthrie  hurried  to  the  rescue.  "  You  remem- 
ber Mr.  Townsend,  of  course,  Hunter,"  she  said. 
"  Betty's  father,  you  know." 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,"  said  the  Doctor.  "Of 
course  I  remember  you,  and  I'm  very  delighted  to  see 
you  again.  You  have  friends  coming  on  the  Oceanic 
too,  then  ?  " 

Townsend  laughed.  "  No,  I  don't  know  anybody 
on  her  —  not  a  soul.  All  the  same  I've  come  to  meet 
your  son." 

"  Indeed !  It's  very  kind  of  you,  I'm  sure."  And 
then  the  Doctor  suddenly  remembered  that  sooner  or 
later  he'd  be  obliged  to  share  Peter  with  the  man  who 
stood  before  him,  and  just  for  a  moment  he  —  like 


i44        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

his  wife  and  like  the  other  father  —  felt  the  inevitable 
stab  of  jealousy.  He  covered  it  with  a  cordial  smile. 
"  What  am  I  thinking  about  ?  Betty  brought  you, 
naturally.  We  must  meet  more  often  now,  Mr. 
Townsend." 

"  I  should  like  nothing  better.  I  don't  know  your 
boy  yet  except  through  his  photographs  and  my  hav- 
ing met  his  mother,  but  I'm  very  proud  to  know  that 
my  little  girl  is  to  bear  a  name  that  will  always  be 
honoured  in  this  country." 

Dr.  Guthrie  blushed  and  bowed,  and  put  his  hand 
up  to  his  tie  nervously. 

It  was  a  curious  little  meeting,  this.  All  three 
parents  were  self-conscious  and  uncomfortable.  They 
would  have  been  antagonistic  but  for  the  very  true 
human  note  that  each  recognized.  They  were  all 
reminded  of  the  unpleasant  fact  that  they  were  in 
sight  of  a  new  and  wide  cross-road  in  their  lives, 
along  which  they  were  presently  to  see  two  of  their 
young  people  walking  away  together  hand  in  hand. 
Parenthood  has  in  it  everything  that  is  beautiful,  but 
much  that  is  disappointing  and  inevitable  —  much  that 
brings  pain  and  a  sudden  sense  of  loneliness. 

There  was  a  very  different  ring  in  the  conversation 
of  Betty  and  Belle,  who  stood  a  few  yards  away  sur- 
rounded by  people  of  all  the  strange  conglomerate 
nationalities  which  go  to  make  up  the  population  of 
the  United  States.  Good-tempered,  affectionate  and 
excitable  Hebrews  were  already  shouting  welcomes  to 
their  friends  on  the  Oceanic,  as  the  vessel  drew  slowly 
nearer.  Temperamental  Irish  were  alternately  wav- 


THE  CITY  145 

ing  handkerchiefs  and  daubing  their  eyes  with  them, 
and  others  —  of  French,  German,  Dutch,  Swedish, 
Norwegian,  Russian  and  English  extraction  —  were 
trying  to  discern  the  faces  of  those  who  were  near 
and  dear  to  them  among  the  passengers  who  were 
leaning  over  the  rails  of  the  vessel.  It  was  an  ani- 
mated and  moving  scene,  very  much  more  cheery  than 
the  ones  which  take  place  on  the  same  spot  when  the 
great  trans-Atlantic  Liners  slip  out  into  the  river. 

"Look!"  cried  Belle.  "There's  Nicholas.  Isn't 
he  absolutely  and  wonderfully  English?  " 

"  And  there's  Peter !  "  said  Betty,  with  a  catch  in 
her  voice.  "  And  isn't  he  splendidly  American  ?  " 

"  Oh,  I'm  so  excited  I  can  hardly  stand  still.  I've 
dreamed  of  this  every  night  ever  since  we  came  home." 

"  So  have  I.  But  this  is  better  than  dreams. 
Look!  Peter  has  seen  us.  He's  waving  his  hat. 
Even  his  hair  seems  to  be  sunburnt." 

Belle  laughed,  though  her  eyes  were  full  of  tears. 
"  I  can  almost  smell  the  violet  stuff  that  Nicholas  puts 
on  his." 

Then  there  was  the  usual  rush  as  the  liner  slid  into 
her  berth,  and  as  Mrs.  Guthrie  was  swept  away  with 
it,  holding  tight  to  Graham's  arm,  she  said  to  herself : 
"  He  waved  to  Betty  first.  O  God,  make  me  brave !  " 

All  the  same,  it  was  the  little  mother  to  whom  Peter 
went  first  as  he  came  ashore,  and  he  held  her  very 
tight,  so  that  she  could  hardly  breathe,  and  said : 
"  Darling  mum !  How  good  to  see  you !  "  and  there 
was  something  in  that. 

The  Doctor  took  his  boy's  big  hand  with  less  self- 


146        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

consciousness  than  usual.  He  wished  that  he  might 
have  had  the  pluck  to  kiss  him  on  both  cheeks  and  thus 
follow  the  excellent  example  of  a  little  fat  Frenchman 
who  had  nearly  thrown  him  off  his  balance  in  his 
eagerness  to  welcome  a  thin,  dark  boy. 

"Hello,  Belle!  Hello,  Graham!  Hello,  Ethel!" 
And  then  Peter  stood  in  front  of  Betty,  to  whom  he 
said  nothing,  but  the  kiss  that  he  gave  her  meant  more 
than  the  whole  of  a  dictionary.  "  Oh,  my  Peter ! " 
she  whispered. 

Nicholas  Kenyon  followed  with  his  most  winning 
smile,  and  was  cordially  welcomed.  He  had  charming 
things  to  say  to  everyone,  especially  to  Belle.  After 
close  scrutiny,  Ethel's  inward  criticism  of  him  was 
that  he  had  "  escaped  being  Oxford." 

And  then  Ranken  Townsend  held  out  his  hand. 
"  But  for  me,  Peter  Guthrie,"  he  said,  "  you  wouldn't 
have  had  a  sweetheart.  Shake !  " 

A  wave  of  color  spread  all  over  Peter's  brown  face. 
He  grasped  the  outstretched  hand.  "  I'm  awfully 
glad  to  see  you,"  he  said. 

"  And  I'm  awfully  glad  to  see  you."  The  artist 
measured  the  boy  up.  Yes,  he  was  well  satisfied. 
Here  stood  a  man  in  whose  clean  eyes  he  recognized 
the  spirit  of  a  boy.  Betty  had  chosen  well.  "  Do 
you  smoke  a  pipe  ?  " 

"  Well,  rather." 

"  I  thought  so.  Bring  it  along  to  my  studio  as  soon 
as  your  mother  can  spare  you  and  we'll  talk  about 
life  and  love  and  the  great  hereafter.  Is  that  a  bet?  " 

"  That's  a  bet,"  said  Peter.     And  he  added,  putting 


THE  CITY  147 

his  mouth  close  to  Betty's  ear :  "  Darling,  he's  a 
corker !  He  likes  me.  Gee,  that's  fine !  "  Then  he 
turned  to  his  mother,  ran  his  arm  round  her  shoulder, 
walked  her  over  to  the  place  in  the  great  echoing,  bus- 
tling shed  over  which  a  huge  "  G  "  hung,  and  sat  down 
with  her  on  somebody  else's  trunk  which  had  just 
been  flung  there,  to  wait  with  unapproving  patience 
for  that  blessed  time  when  one  of  the  officialdom's 
chewing  gods,  having  forced  a  prying  hand  among  his 
shirts  and  underclothing,  should  mark  his  baggage 
with  a  magic  cross  and  so  permit  him  to  reconnect 
himself  with  life. 

Nicholas  Kenyon,  as  immaculate  as  though  he  had 
just  emerged  from  a  bandbox,  slipped  his  hand  sur- 
reptitiously into  Belle's.  "  Are  you  glad  to  see  me  ?  " 
he  asked,  under  his  breath. 

Belle  said  nothing  in  reply,  but  the  look  that  she 
gave  him  instead  set  that  expert's  blood  facing  through 
his  veins  and  gave  him  something  to  look  forward  to 
that  alone  made  it  worth  crossing  a  waste  of  unneces- 
sary water. 

VI 

"  A  VERY  pleasant  domestic  evening,"  said  Kenyon, 
standing  with  his  back  to  the  fireplace  of  the  library. 
'  The  bosom  of  this  family  is  certainly  very  warm. 
Peter,  my  dear  old  boy,  I  had  no  idea  that  you  were 
going  to  bring  me  to  a  house  in  which  a  Prime  Min- 
ister or  the  President  of  the  Royal  Academy  might 
be  very  proud  to  dwell.  Also,  may  I  congratulate  you 


i48        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

upon  your  little  sister?  She's  a  humorist.  I  found 
myself  furbishing  up  all  my  epigrams  when  I  spoke 
to  her.  By  Jove,  she's  like  a  Baliol  blood  with  his 
hair  in  a  braid." 

A  quiet  chuckle  came  from  Graham,  who  was  sit- 
ting on  the  arm  of  a  big  deep  chair,  looking  up  at  Ken- 
yon  with  the  sort  of  admiration  that  is  paid  by  a 
student  to  his  master.  "  I  don't  know  anything  about 
Baliol  bloods,"  he  said,  "  but  Ethel  takes  a  lot  of  beat- 
ing. When  she  quoted  Bernard  Shaw,  at  dinner, 
father  nearly  swallowed  his  fork." 

Peter  was  sitting  on  the  table,  swinging  his  legs. 

"  Oh,  she'll  be  all  right  when  she  gets  away  from 
her  school.  She'll  grow  younger  every  day  then. 
What  awful  places  they  are  —  these  American  girl 
schools.  They  seem  to  inject  into  their  victims  a  sort 
of  liquid  artificiality.  It  takes  a  lot  of  living  down. 
Upon  my  soul,  I  hardly  knew  the  kid!  Two  years 
have  made  a  most  tremendous  difference  in  her.  I 
thought  I  should  throw  a  fit  when  she  looked  at  me 
just  now  in  the  drawing-room  and  said :  '  The  child- 
ish influence  of  Oxford  has  left  you  almost  unspoiled, 
Peter,  dear.' " 

Kenyon  laughed.  "  Excellent ! "  he  said.  "  I 
know  the  English  flapper  pretty  well.  It'll  give  me 
extreme  delight  to  play  Columbus  among  the  Amer- 
ican variety  of  the  species."  He  looked  round  the 
beautiful  room  with  an  approving  eye.  "  That  must 
have  been  a  very  civilized  old  gentleman  who  made 
this  collection.  I  wonder  if  he  bought  some  of  the 
books  from  Thrapstone-Wynyates !  My  father  was 


THE  CITY  149 

forced  to  sell  some  of  them  shortly  after  he  succeeded 
to  the  title.  As  the  long  arm  of  coincidence  fre- 
quently stretches  across  the  Atlantic,  I  should  like  to 
think  that  some  of  the  first  editions  in  which  my 
grandfather  took  so  high  a  pride  have  found  their 
way  into  an  atmosphere  so  entirely  pleasant  as  this. 
One  of  these  fine  days,  Peter,  they  may  raise  a  little 
necessary  bullion  for  you." 

"  I  hope  not,"  said  Peter. 

Graham  got  up.  "  It's  only  eleven  o'clock.  Sup- 
pose we  get  out  and  see  something.  Everybody's 
gone  to  bed,  we  shan't  be  missed." 

"  A  very  brainy  notion,"  said  Kenyon,  "  but  what's 
there  to  do  ?  " 

"  Oodles  of  things,"  said  Graham. 

"Well,  lead  the  way.  I'm  with  you.  The  dull 
monotony  of  life  aboard  a  liner  has  given  me  a  thirst 
for  twinkling  ankles,  the  clash  of  cymbals  and  the 
glare  of  the  lime-light.  You  with  us,  Peter?  " 

"  Yes,  unless  —  one  second."  He  went  over  to  the 
telephone  that  stood  on  a  small  table  in  a  far  corner 
of  the  room,  looked  up  a  number  in  the  book,  asked 
for  it  and  hung  on. 

Kenyon  shot  a  wink  at  Graham.  "  Get  your  hat,' 
old  boy,"  he  said.  "  Peter  would  a-wooing  go.  He's 
the  most  desperately  thorough  person."  And  he 
added  inwardly :  "  Hang  that  girl." 

"  Can  I  speak  to  Mr.  Townsend  ?  Oh,  is  that  you, 
Mr.  Townsend?  Peter  Guthrie,  yes.  May  I  come 
round  and  have  a  jaw  —  ?  Thanks,  awfully!  I'll 
get  a  taxi  right  away."  He  turned  back  to  the  other 


150        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

two  men.  "  Great  work,"  he  said.  "  You  two  will 
have  to  go  alone  to-night.  However,  we've  a  thou- 
sand years  in  front  of  us.  See  you  at  breakfast.  So 
long!" 

"  Wait  a  second,"  said  Graham.  "  I'll  ring  up  a 
taxi  and  we'll  all  ride  down  together." 

"  Right-o !  "  said  Peter.  "  I'll  rush  up  to  my  room 
and  get  a  pipe." 

When  he  came  down  again  he  found  Kenyon  and 
Graham  waiting  at  the  open  door.  A  taxicab  was 
chugging  on  the  curbstone.  Kenyon  got  in  first,  with 
his  long  cigarette  holder  between  his  teeth  and  a 
rakish-looking  opera  hat  balanced  over  his  left  eye. 
He  carried  a  thin  black  overcoat.  All  about  him  there 
was  the  very  essence  of  Piccadilly.  Peter  sat  beside 
him  and  Graham  opposite.  The  cab  turned  round, 
crossed  Madison  into  Fifth  Avenue  and  went  quickly 
downtown.  The  great  wide  street,  as  shiny  as  that 
of  the  Champs  Ely  see,  was  comparatively  clear  of 
traffic.  Peter  looked  at  the  passing  houses  with  the 
intense  and  affectionate  interest  of  the  man  who  comes 
home  again.  At  the  corner  of  West  Forty-second 
Street  Graham  stopped  the  cab.  "  It's  only  a  short 
walk  to  the  best  of  the  cabarets,"  he  said ;  "  we'll  let 
Peter  go  straight  on.  Come  on,  Nicholas,  bundle 
out." 

''Where  are  we  going?"  asked  Kenyon,  making  a 
graceful  exit, 

"  Louis  Martin's,  old  boy,"  said  Graham. 

"  Pretty  hot  stuff,  I  hope.  Au  revoir,  Peter.  Do 
your  b^st  to  make  the  b§ardecl  paint  merchant  like  you, 


THE  CITY  151 

You'll  have  some  difficulty."  And  with  that  parting 
shot,  contradicted  by  one  of  the  winning  smiles  which 
he  had  inherited  from  his  delightful  but  unscrupulous 
father,  Nicholas  Kenyon  took  Graham's  arm  and  these 
two  walked  away  in  high  spirits. 

When  the  cab  stopped  at  the  high  building  on  the 
corner  of  Gramercy  Park,  its  door  was  opened  by 
Ranken  Townsend.  "  I  timed  you  to  arrive  about 
now,  my  lad,"  he  said  cordially.  "  I  took  the  oppor- 
tunity of  getting  some  air.  It's  mighty  good  to-night. 
Come  right  up."  He  continued  to  talk  in  the  ele- 
vator, which  had  a  long  way  to  go.  "  Betty  has  gone 
to  a  party.  You  may  meet  her  mother,  I'm  not  sure. 
She's  out  at  one  of  her  meetings  —  she  spends  her 
life  at  meetings  —  and  if  she  comes  in  tired,  as  she 
generally  does,  she  probably  won't  come  into  the 
studio.  However,  that  need  only  be  a  pleasure  de- 
ferred. Do  you  speak?  If  so,  she'll  nail  you  for  one 
of  her  platforms." 

"I, —  speak?"  said  Peter,  with  a  shudder.  "I'd 
rather  be  shot." 

Townsend  laughed,  led  the  way  into  his  apartment 
and  into  the  studio.  In  the  dim  light  of  one  reading 
lamp  which  stood  on  a  small  table  at  the  side  of  a  low 
divan,  the  room  looked  larger  than  it  was.  It  reeked 
with  the  good  ripe  smell  of  pipe  tobacco  and  seemed 
to  be  pervaded  with  the  personality  of  the  man  who 
spent  most  of  his  life  in  it.  One  of  the  top  windows 
was  open  and  through  it  came  the  refreshing  air  that 
blew  up  from  the  Hudson.  Peter  caught  a  glimpse 
of  the  sky,  which  was  alive  with  stars.  It  was  a  good 


152        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

place.  He  liked  it.  Work  was  done  there.  It 
inspired  him. 

The  artist  took  Peter's  hat  and  coat  and  hung  them 
in  the  alcove.  Then  he  went  across  the  room  and 
turned  up  the  light  that  hung  over  a  canvas.  "  How 
d'ycm  like  it  ?  "  he  asked. 

Peter  gave  an  involuntary  cry.  There  sat  Betty 
with  her  hands  folded  in  her  lap.  To  Peter  she 
seemed  to  have  been  caught  at  the  very  moment  when 
from  his  place  at  her  feet  he  looked  up  at  her  just 
before  he  held  her  in  his  arms  for  the  first  time.  Her 
face  was  alight  and  her  eyes  full  of  tenderness.  It 
was  an  exquisite  piece  of  work. 

Townsend  turned  out  the  light.  He  was  well 
pleased  with  its  effect.  Peter's  face  was  far  better 
than  several  columns  of  printed  eulogy.  "  Now  come 
and  sit  down,"  he  said.  "  Try  this  mixture.  It  took 
me  five  years  to  discover  it,  but  since  then  I've  used 
no  other."  He  threw  himself  on  the  settee  and  set- 
tled his  untidy  head  among  the  cushions. 

The  light  shone  on  Peter's  strong  profile,  and  when 
Townsend  looked  at  it  he  saw  there  all  that  he  hoped 
to  see,  and  something  else.  There  was  a  little  smile 
round  the  boy's  mouth  and  a  look  in  his  eyes  that 
showed  all  the  warmth  of  his  heart. 

"And  so  you  love  my  little  girl  as  much  as  that? 
Well,  she  deserves  it,  but  please  don't  take  her  away 
from  me  yet.  I  can't  spare  her.  She  and  my  work 
are  all  I've  got,  and  I'm  not  lying  when  I  say  that  she 
comes  first.  Generally  when  a  man  reaches  my  age 
he  has  lived  down  his  dependence  on  other  people  for 


THE  CITY  153 

happiness  and  his  work  has  become  his  mistress,  his 
wife  and  his  children.  In  my  case  that  isn't  so,  and 
my  little  girl  is  the  best  I  have.  She  keeps  me  young, 
Peter.  She  renders  my  disappointments  almost  null 
and  void,  and  she  encourages  me  not  wholly  to  sacrifice 
myself  to  the  filthy  dollar  —  an  easy  temptation  I  can 
assure  you.  So  don't  be  in  too  great  a  hurry  to  take 
my  little  bird  away  and  build  a  nest  for  her  in  another 
tree.  Does  that  sound  very  selfish  to  you  ?  " 

"No,"  said  Peter;  "I  understand.  Besides  — 
good  Lord !  —  I've  got  to  work  before  I  can  make 
a  place  good  enough  for  her.  I've  come  back  to 
begin." 

"I  see!  Fine!  I  thought  perhaps  that  Oxford 
might  have  taken  some  of  the  good  American  grit  out 
of  you.  It  just  occurred  to  me  that  you  might  be  go- 
ing to  let  your  father  keep  you  while  you  continue  to 
remain  an  undergraduate  out  here  in  life.  A  good 
many  of  our  young  men  with  wealthy  fathers  play  that 
game,  believe  me." 

"  Yes,  I  know,"  said  Peter,  "  but  there's  something 
in  my  blood, —  I  think  it's  porridge, —  that  urges  me 
to  do  things  for  myself.  Besides,  I  believe  that  there's 
a  feeling  of  gratitude  somewhere  about  me  that  makes 
me  want  to  pay  back  my  father  for  all  that  he's  done. 
I'm  most  awfully  keen  to  do  that,  Mr.  Townsend! 
His  money  has  come  by  accident.  I'm  not  going  to 
take  advantage  of  it.  I'm  going  to  start  in  just  as  if 
he  were  the  same  hard-working  doctor  that  he  used 
to  be  when  he  sent  me  to  Harvard,  skinning  himself 
to  do  so.  I  think  he'll  like  that.  Anyway,  that's  my 


154        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

plan.  And  as  to  Oxford, —  well,  I  should  have  to  be 
a  pretty  rotten  sort  of  a  dog  if  I  didn't  gain  something 
there  —  that  wonderful  place  out  of  which  men  have 
gone,  for  centuries,  all  the  better  for  having  rushed 
over  its  quads  and  churned  up  the  water  of  its  little 
old  river  and  stood  humbly  in  its  chapels.  Don't  you 
think  so?" 

"  I  do  indeed,  my  dear  lad ;  but  somehow  or  other 
the  younger  generation  doesn't  seem  to  take  advantage 
of  those  things,  and  the  sight  of  the  young  men  of 
the  present  day  and  their  callous  acceptance  of  their 
fathers'  efforts  make  me  thank  God  that  I  never  had  a 
boy.  I  should  be  afraid.  Think  of  that!  What  are 
you  going  to  do,  Peter?  What  is  your  line  of 
work?" 

"  The  law/' 

"  The  law  ?  Well,  I  guess  that's  a  queer  sort  of 
maze  to  put  yourself  into.  An  honest  man  in  the  law 
is  like  a  rabbit  in  a  dog  kennel.  Is  that  your  definite 
decision?  " 

"  Absolutely,"  said  Peter.  "  I  chose  the  law  for 
that  reason.  I  think  that  honesty  is  badly  needed  in 
it.  I've  got  a  dream  that  one  of  these  days  I  shall  be 
a  judge  and  make  things  a  bit  easier  for  all  the  poor 
devils  who  have  made  mistakes." 

"God  help  you!" 

"  I  shall  ask  him  to,"  said  Peter. 

The  artist  looked  up  quickly.  In  his  further  keen 
and  rather  wistful  scrutiny  of  the  great  big  square- 
shouldered  man  with  the  strong,  clean  jaw-line  and 
the  firm  mouth  there  was  a  little  astonishment.  "  Do 


THE  CITY  155 

you  mean  to  tell  me  that  in  the  middle  of  these  queer 
undisciplined,  individualistic  times  you  believe  in 
God?" 

The  room  remained  in  silence  for  a  moment,  until 
Peter  leaned  forward  and  knocked  out  his  pipe.  "If 
I  didn't  believe  in  God,"  he  replied  quietly,  "  would 
you  be  quite  so  ready  to  trust  Betty  to  me  ?  " 

At  that  moment  the  door  was  swung  open  and  a 
tall,  stout,  hard-bosomed  woman  with  a  mass  of  white 
hair  and  the  carriage  of  a  battleship  sailed  in.  Her 
evening  clothes  glistened  with  sequins  and  many  large 
beads  rattled  as  she  came  forward.  She  wore  a  string 
of  pearls  and  several  diamond  rings.  Unable  to  fight 
any  longer  against  advancing  years  and  preserve  what 
had  evidently  been  quite  remarkable  good  looks,  she 
had  cultivated  a  presence  and  developed  distinction. 
In  any  meeting  of  women  she  was  inevitably  voted  to 
the  chair,  and  in  the  natural  order  of  things  became 
president  of  all  the  Societies  to  which  she  attached  her- 
self, except  one.  In  this  isolated  case  the  woman  who 
supplanted  her,  for  the  time  being,  was  even  taller, 
stouter  and  harder  of  bosom, —  in  fact,  a  born  presi- 
dent. 

The  two  men  rose. 

"Ah,  Ranken,  still  up,  then!  I  half-expected  to 
find  the  studio  in  darkness.  You'll  be  glad  to  hear 
that  we  passed  a  unanimous  resolution  to-night  con- 
demning this  country  as  a  republic  and  asking  that  it 
shall  become  a  monarchy  forthwith." 

Townsend  refrained  from  looking  at  Peter.  "  In- 
deed ! "  he  said  gravely.  "  An  evening  well  spent. 


156        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

But  I  want  you  to  know  Peter  Guthrie,  Dr.  Hunter 
Guthrie's  eldest  son,  just  home  from  Oxford." 

Mrs.  Townsend  extended  a  large  well-formed  hand. 
"  Let  me  see !  What  do  I  know  about  you  ?  You're 
the  young  man  who —  Oh,  now  I  remember. 
You're  engaged  to  Betty.  But  before  I  forget  it,  and 
as  you  are  just  out  of  Oxford,  I'll  put  you  down  to 
speak  at  the  annual  meeting  next  Tuesday  at  the  Wal- 
dorf, of  the  Society  for  the  Reconstruction  of  Uni- 
versity Systems.  Your  subject  will  be  '  Oxford  as  a 
Menace  to  the  Younger  Generation.'  There  will  be 
no  fee  —  I  beg  your  pardon  ?  " 

Peter's  face  was  a  study  in  conflicting  emotions. 
He  looked  like  a  lonely  man  being  run  away  with  in 
a  car  that  he  was  wholly  unable  to  drive.  Townsend 
turned  a  burst  of  laughter  into  a  rasping  cough. 
"  You're  awfully  kind,"  said  Peter,  almost  stammer- 
ing. "  But  I  believe  in  Oxford." 

"  Ah !  Then  you  shall  say  so  to  the  Society  for  the 
Encouragement  of  Universities,  on  Thursday  at  eight 
sharp,  at  the  St.  Mary's  Public  School  Building,  Brook- 
lyn." 

"As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  don't  speak,"  said  Peter. 
"I  —  I  never  speak." 

"  Why,  then,  you  shall  be  one  of  the  chief  thinkers 
at  the  bi-monthly  meeting  of  the  Calif ornian  Cogita- 
tors.  I'm  not  going  to  let  you  off,  so  make  up  your 
mind  to  that.  And  now  I'm  going  to  bed.  I'm  as 
tired  as  a  dog.  Good-bye,  Paul, —  I  mean  Peter.  Ex- 
pect me  to  call  you  up  one  day  soon.  There's  so  much 
to  do  with  this  world  chaos  that  we  must  all  put  our 


THE  CITY  157 

hands  to  the  wheel."  And  with  a  wave  of  her  hand, 
Mrs.  Townsend  sailed  majestically  away. 

Peter  gasped  for  breath  and  the  artist  subsided  into 
the  divan  and  gave  way  to  an  attack  —  a  very  spasm 
—  of  laughter,  which  left  him  limp  and  weak. 

"  Never  allow  Betty  to  get  bitten  by  the  meeting- 
bug,  son,"  he  said,  when  he  had  recovered.  "  It  isn't 
any  fun  to  be  married  to  a  bunch  of  pamphlets. 
What !  Are  you  off  now  ?  " 

"  I'm  afraid  I've  kept  you  up,  as  it  is,  Mr.  Town- 
send.  I  —  I  want  to  thank  you  for  your  immense  kind- 
ness to  me.  I  shall  always  remember  it.  Good 
night!" 

Rankin  Townsend  got  up,  stood  in  front  of  Peter 
for  a  moment  and  looked  straight  at  him.  He  was 
serious  again.  "  Good  night,  my  dear  lad,"  he  said. 
"  I  feel  that  I  can  trust  Betty  to  you  and  that  takes  a 
load  off  my  mind.  Come  often  and  stay  later." 

Peter  walked  all  the  way  home  along  Madison  Ave- 
nue. That  part,  at  any  rate,  of  the  great  sleepless 
city  was  resting  and  quiet,  and  the  boy's  quick  foot- 
steps echoed  through  the  empty  street.  He  was  glad 
to  be  back  again  in  New  York  —  glad  and  thankful. 
Somewhere,  in  one  of  her  big  buildings,  was  his  love- 
girl —  the  woman  who  was  to  be  his  wife  —  the  rea- 
son of  his  having  been  born  into  the  world.  No  won- 
der he  believed  in  God. 


158        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 


VII 

THE  following  afternoon  Peter  was  to  call  at  the 
apartment-house  on  Gramercy  Park  at  half-past-four. 
He  had  arranged  to  take  Betty  for  a  walk, —  a  good 
long  tramp.  There  were  heaps  of  things  that  he 
wanted  to  tell  her  and  hear,  and  several  points  on  which 
he  wanted  to  ask  her  advice.  He  was  not  merely 
punctual,  as  becomes  a  man  who  is  head  over  heels 
in  love  —  he  was  ten  minutes  before  his  time.  All  the 
same,  he  found  Betty  waiting  for  him  in  the  hall, 
talking  to  a  big  burly  Irishman  who  condescended  to 
act  as  hall-porter  and  who  looked  not  unlike  a  briga- 
dier-general in  his  rather  over-smart  uniform.  This 
man  had  known  Betty  for  many  years  and  watched  her 
grow  up;  had  received  many  kindnesses  from  her  and 
had  seen  her  bend  by  the  hour  over  the  cot  of  his  own 
little  girl  when  she  was  ill.  His  face  was  a  study 
when  he  saw  Peter  bound  into  the  place,  catch  sight 
of  Betty  and  take  her  in  his  arms,  and  without  a  single 
touch  of  self-consciousness  pour  out  a  burst  of  in- 
coherent joy  at  being  with  her  once  more. 

Catching  his  expression,  in  which  surprise,  resent- 
ment and  a  sort  of  jealousy  were  all  mixed,  Betty  said, 
when  she  got  a  chance:  "Peter,  this  is  a  friend  of 
mine,  Mr.  O'Grady." 

Peter  turned  and  held  out  his  hand.  "  How  are 
you?  All  Miss  Townsend's  friends  have  got  to  be 
my  friends  now." 

The  Irishman's  vanity  was  greatly  appealed  to  by 


THE  CITY  159 

the  simple  manliness  of  Peter's  greeting,  his  cheery 
smile  and  his  utter  lack  of  side.  He  smiled  back  and, 
having  given  the  hand  a  warm  grip,  drew  himself  up 
and  saluted.  At  one  time  he  had  served  in  the  British 
Army,  and  he  wanted  Peter  to  know  it.  He  would 
have  told  him  the  story  of  his  life  then  and  there  with, 
very  likely,  a  few  picturesque  additions,  but  before 
he  could  arrange  his  opening  sentence  the  two  young 
people  were  out  in  the  street.  He  watched  them  go 
off  together,  the  one  so  broad  and  big,  the  other  so 
slight  and  sweet,  and  said  to  himself,  rolling  a  new 
quid  of  tobacco  between  his  fingers:  "Ah,  thin;  it's 
love's  young  dream  once  more !  And  it's  a  man  he  is. 
God  bless  both  of  them!  " 

"  Are  you  feeling  strong  to-day,  darling  ?  "  asked 
Peter. 

"  Strong  as  a  lion,"  said  Betty.     "  Why  ?  " 

"  Because  I'm  going  to  walk  you  up  the  Avenue  and 
into  the  Park  and  about  six  times  round  the  reservoir. 
Can  you  stand  it  ?  " 

Betty  laughed.  "  Try  me,  and  if  I  faint  from  ex- 
haustion you  can  carry  me  into  the  street  and  call  a 
taxi-cab.  I'm  not  afraid  of  anything  with  you." 

"  That's  fine !  This  is  the  first  time  we've  been 
really  alone  since  I  came  back.  It'll  take  from  now 
until  the  middle  of  next  week  to  tell  you  even  half 
the  things  I've  got  to  say.  First  of  all,  I  love 
you." 

"Darling  Peter." 

"  I  love  you  more  than  I  ever  did,  much  more  —  a 
hundred  times  more  —  and  I  don't  care  who  hears  me 


i6o        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

say  so."  That  was  true.  He  made  this  statement, 
not  in  a  whisper,  but  in  his  natural  voice,  and  it  was 
overheard  by  several  passers-by  who  turned  their 
heads, —  and  being  women,  smiled  sympathetically  and 
went  on  their  way  with  the  deep  thrill  of  the  young 
giant's  voice  ringing  in  their  ears  like  music. 

They  stood  for  a  moment  on  the  curbstone  trying 
to  find  an  opportunity  to  cross  the  street.  Betty  gave 
herself  up  to  the  masterly  person  at  her  side  without 
a  qualm.  She  adored  being  led  by  the  arm  through 
traffic  which  she  wouldn't  have  dared  to  dodge  had 
she  been  alone.  It  gave  her  a  new  and  splendid  sense 
of  security  and  dependence. 

The  rain  had  begun  to  fall  softly.  It  gathered 
strength  as  they  turned  into  Fifth  Avenue,  and  came 
down  smartly.  Betty  didn't  intend  to  say  a  word  about 
the  fact  that  she  was  wearing  a  new  hat.  It  had  es- 
caped Peter's  notice.  Her  face  was  all  he  saw.  He 
wasn't  even  aware  that  it  was  raining  until  he  took 
her  arm  and  found  her  sleeve  was  wet. 

"Good  Lord!"  he  said.  "This  won't  do.  Dash 
this  rain,  it's  going  to  spoil  our  walk.  Where  can  we 
go?  I  know."  A  line  of  taxis  was  standing  on  a 
stand.  He  opened  the  door  of  the  first  one.  "  Pop 
in,  baby,"  he  said.  "  We'll  drive  to  the  Ritz  and  have 
tea.  I  can't  have  you  getting  wet." 

Betty  popped  in,  not  really  so  profoundly  sorry  to 
escape  that  strenuous  walk  as  Peter  was. 

Being  a  wise  man  he  took  full  advantage  of  the  taxi- 
cab,  and  for  all  the  fact  that  it  was  broad  daylight 
and  that  anybody  who  chose  could  watch  him,  he  gave 


THE  CITY  161 

Betty  a  series  of  kisses  which  did  something  to  make 
up  for  lost  time  and  a  long  separation.  The  new  hat 
suffered  rather  in  the  process,  but  what  did  that  mat- 
ter ?  This  was  love.  Hats  could  be  replaced  —  such 
a  love  as  his,  never. 

"  Your  father  is  a  great  chap,"  said  Peter.  "  We 
had  a  good  yarn  last  night.  By  Jove!  I  wish  my 
father  had  something  of  his  friendly  way.  I  felt 
that  there  was  nothing  I  couldn't  tell  him  —  nothing 
that  he  wouldn't  understand.  Well,  well;  there  it  is. 
Graham  and  I  will  have  to  worry  along  as  best  we  may. 
Everything'll  come  out  all  right,  I  hope." 

"  How  did  you  like  mother  ?  "  asked  Betty. 

"  Well,"  said  Peter,  considering  his  answer  with 
the  greatest  care,  "  she's  undoubtedly  a  wonderful 
woman,  but  she  scares  me  to  death.  The  very  first 
thing  she  did  was  to  ask  me  to  speak  at  one  of  her 
meetings." 

Betty  burst  out  laughing.  "What — ?  Already? 
When  are  you  speaking?  What  are  you  going  to 
say?" 

"  Good  Lord !  What  can  I  say  ?  I  can  recite  the 
Jabberwocky  or  the  alphabet  in  English,  French  and 
American,  but  that  finishes  my  repertory.  Can  you 
see  me  standing  on  a  platform  as  white  as  a  sheet  try- 
ing to  stammer  out  a  few  idiotic  sentences  to  a  room 
full  of  women  ?  Look  here !  You've  got  to  get  it  out 
of  her  head  that  I  can  be  of  the  slightest  use  to  her. 
Tell  her  I  stutter,  or  that  I've  got  no  roof  to  my  mouth 
—  anything  you  like  —  but,  for  goodness  sake,  have 
my  name  taken  off  her  list.  Will  you  promise  that? 


162        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Already  I  wake  up  in  the  middle  of  the  night  in  an 
absolute  panic." 

"  Don't  worry,"  said  Betty,  "  Mother's  a  very 
strong-minded  woman,  but  she's  awfully  easy  to 
manage.  And  now  I  want  you  to  promise  me  some- 
thing." 

"  Anything  in  the  world,"  said  Peter. 

"  Well,  then,  don't  mistake  the  Ritz  for  that  dear 
little  open  place  where  the  fairies  dance,  and  suddenly 
kiss  me  in  front  of  the  band  and  all  the  people  having 
tea." 

"  Hard  luck,"  said  Peter.  "  I'll  do  the  best  I  can. 
But  you're  such  an  angel  and  you  look  so  frightfully 
nice  that  I  shall  have  all  I  can  do  to  keep  sane." 

The  cab  drew  up  and  they  got  out,  went  through  the 
silly  swinging  doors  which  separate  a  man  from  his 
girl  for  a  precious  moment  and  into  the  Palm  Court 
where  the  band  was  playing.  Peter  gave  his  hat  and 
stick  to  a  disgruntled  waiter,  who  would  have  told 
him  to  check  them  outside  but  for  his  height  and 
width. 

The  place  was  extraordinarily  full  for  the  time  of 
year.  Everywhere  there  were  women,  and  every  one 
of  them  was  wearing  some  sort  of  erect  feather  in  her 
hat.  It  gave  the  place  the  appearance  of  a  large 
chicken  run  after  a  prolonged  fracas.  The  band  was 
playing  the  emotional  music  of  La  Boheme.  It  was 
in  its  best  form.  The  waiter  led  them  to  a  little  table 
under  a  mimic  window-sill  which  was  crowded  with 
plants.  Many  heads  turned  after  them  as  they  ad- 
ventured between  the  chattering  groups.  It  was  so 


THE  CITY  163 

easy  to  see  that  their  impending  marriage  had  been  ar- 
ranged in  Heaven. 

"What  sort  of  tea  do  you  like?"  asked  Peter. 
"  Anything  hot  and  wet,  or  have  you  a  choice  ? 
Really,  I  don't  know  the  difference  between  one  and 
another." 

But  Betty  did.  Hadn't  she  kept  house  for  her 
father?  "Orange  Pekoe  tea,"  she  said,  "and  but- 
tered toast." 

Peter  made  it  so,  and  in  sitting  down  nearly  knocked 
xover  the  table.  He  was  too  big  for  such  places  and 
his  legs  got  in  the  way  of  everything.  At  the  other 
end  of  the  room  Kenyon  was  sitting  with  Belle.  Betty 
had  seen  them  at  once,  but  she  held  her  peace.  For 
the  first  time  in  her  life  she  appreciated  the  fact  that 
two  is  company.  Both  men  were  too  occupied  to 
recognize  anybody. 

Peter  was  very  happy  and  full  of  enthusiasm  about 
everything,  and  Betty  was  an  eager  listener  as  he  talked 
about  her  and  himself  and  the  future,  while  she  poured 
out  the  tea.  It  was  all  very  delightful  and  domestic 
and  new  and  exhilarating,  and  it  didn't  require  much 
imagination  on  the  part  of  either  of  them  to  believe 
that  they  were  sitting  in  their  own  house,  far  away 
from  people,  and  that  Peter  had  just  come  home  after 
a  long  day's  work,  and  that  the  band  was  their  new 
Victrola  performing  in  the  corner.  Only  one  thing 
made  Betty  aware  of  the  fact  that  they  were  in  the 
Ritz  Hotel,  and  that  was  the  pattern  of  the  teacups. 
She  never  would  have  chosen  such  things,  and  if  they 
had  been  given  to  her  as  a  wedding  present  she  would 


164        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

have  packed  them  away  in  some  far-off  cupboard.  She 
had  already  made  up  her  mind  that  their  first  tea  serv- 
ice was  going  to  be  blue-and-white,  because  it  would 
go  with  her  drawing-room, —  the  drawing-room  which 
she  had  furnished  in  her  dreams. 

"  I  don't  think  you'd  better  do  that,  Peter,"  whis- 
pered Betty  suddenly. 

"  Do  what,  darling?  "  Butter  wouldn't  have  melted 
in  his  mouth. 

"Why,   hold  my  hand.     Everybody  can  see." 

"  Not  if  you  put  it  behind  this  end  of  the  table- 
cloth. Besides,  what  if  they  can?  I'm  not  ashamed 
of  being  in  love.  Are  you?  " 

"  No ;  I  glory  in  it.     But " 

"  But  what  ?  "     He  held  it  tighter. 

"  I  think  you'd  better  give  it  back  to  me.  There's 
an  old  lady  frowning." 

"  Oh,  she's  only  a  poor  benighted  spinster.  And 
anyhow  she's  not  frowning.  She  put  her  eyebrows 
on  in  the  dark." 

"  Very  well,  Peter.  I  suppose  you  know  best." 
And  Betty  made  no  further  attempts  to  rescue  her 
hand. 

She  had  two  good  reasons  for  leaving  it  there, —  the 
first,  that  she  liked  it,  and  the  second  that  she  couldn't 
take  it  away.  But  she  made  sure  that  it  was  hidden 
by  the  tablecloth. 

"  Won't  you  smoke,  Peter  ?  " 

"  Oh,  thanks.     May  I  ?  " 

"  All  the  other  men  are." 

Peter  took  out  his  case  and  his  cigarette  holder. 


THE  CITY  165 

It  was  very  easy  to  take  out  a  cigarette  with  one 
hand,  but  for  the  life  of  him  he  couldn't  manoeuvre 
it  into  the  tube.  Was  he  so  keen  to  smoke  that  he 
would  let  her  hand  go? 

He  gave  it  up  and  broke  into  a  smile  that  almost 
made  Betty  bend  forward  and  plant  a  resounding  kiss 
on  his  square  chin.  "  Well,  I'm  dashed,"  he  said. 
"  I  believe  you  asked  me  to  smoke  on  purpose  to  get 
free." 

"  I  did,"  she  said.  "  Peter,  you're  —  you're  just  a 
darling." 

And  that  was  why  he  upset  the  glass  of  water. 

Presently  he  said,  when  peace  was  restored: 
"What  d'you  think  I've  done  to-day?  I've  fixed  up 
a  seat  in  the  law  office  of  two  friends  of  mine.  They 
were  at  Harvard  with  me  —  corkers  both.  I  intend 
to  start  work  next  week.  Isn't  that  fine?  We're 
going  to  mop  up  all  the  work  in  the  city.  Darling, 
that  apartment  of  ours  is  getting  nearer  and  nearer. 
I  shall  be  a  tired  business  man  soon  and  shall 
want  a  home  to  go  to,  with  a  little  wife  waiting 
for  me." 

And  Betty  said :  "  How  soon  do  you  think  that'll 
be?" 

Before  Peter  could  answer,  Belle's  ringing  voice 
broke  in.  She  and  Kenyon  had  come  up  unnoticed. 
"  The  turtle  doves,"  she  said.  "  Isn't  it  beautiful, 
Nick?" 

"Well,  rather!" 

And  the  spell  was  broken.  They  little  knew,  these 
two  who  were  so  happy,  that  in  the  fertile  brain  of  the 


i66        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

man  who  stood  smiling  at  them  was  the  germ  of  a 
plan  which  would  break  their  engagement  and  bring 
a  black  cloud  over  the  scene. 


VIII 

THE  family  dined  early  that  evening.  Graham  had 
taken  a  box  at  the  Maxine  Elliott  Theatre.  He  and 
Kenyon  and  Peter  vvere  to  take  Belle  and  Betty  there 
to  see  a  play  by  Edward  Sheldon,  about  which  every- 
body was  talking.  Little  Mrs.  Guthrie,  who  was  to 
have  been  one  of  the  party,  had  decided  to  stay  at 
home,  because  the  Doctor  was  not  feeling  very  well, 
and  so  she  was  going  to  sit  with  him  in  the  library 
and  see  that  he  went  to  bed  early,  and  give  him  a  dose 
of  one  of  those  old-fashioned  cures  in  which  she  was 
a  great  believer. 

Naturally  enough,  although  he  was  not  an  ardent 
play-goer,  Peter  was  looking  forward  with  keen  pleas- 
ure to  the  evening  because  he  would  be  able  to  sit  close 
to  Betty  and  from  time  to  time  whisper  in  her  ear. 
During  dinner,  however,  which  was  a  very  merry 
meal,  with  Kenyon  keeping  everyone  in  fits  of  laugh- 
ter, Peter  caught  something  in  his  mother's  eyes  which 
made  him  revolutionize  his  plans.  The  little  mother 
laughed  as  frequently  as  the  rest  of  them, —  to  the 
casual  observer  she  was  merry  and  bright,  with  noth- 
ing on  her  mind  except  the  slight  indisposition  of  the 
Doctor.  But  Peter,  who  possessed  an  intuitive  eye 
which  had  a  knack  of  seeing  underneath  the  surface 


THE  CITY  167 

of  things  and  whose  keen  sympathy  for  those  he  loved 
was  very  easily  stirred,  became  aware  of  the  fact  that 
his  mother  was  only  simulating  light-heartedness  and 
stood  in  need  of  something  from  him. 

He  threw  his  mind  back  quickly,  and  in  a  moment 
knew  what  was  wrong.  During  the  short  time  that 
he  had  been  back  in  the  city  he  had  forgotten  to  give 
his  little  mother  anything  of  himself.  That  was  wrong 
and  ungrateful  and  extremely  selfish,  and  must  be 
remedied  at  once. 

Without  a  moment's  hesitation  he  decided  to  cut 
two  acts  of  the  play  and  do  everything  that  he  could 
to  prove  to  the  little  mother  who  meant  so  much  to 
him  that,  although  he  was  engaged  to  be  married,  she 
still  retained  her  place  in  his  heart. 

Dinner  over,  he  went  quickly  to  the  door  and  opened 
it,  and  as  his  mother  passed  out  he  put  his  arm  round 
her  shoulders  and  whispered,  "  Mummie,  dear,  slip 
up  to  your  room  and  wait  there  for  me.  I  want  to 
talk  to  you."  The  look  of  gratitude  that  he  received 
from  the  dear  little  woman  was  an  immense  reward 
for  his  unselfishness.  Then  he  went  up  to  Graham 
and  said :  "  Look  here,  old  boy,  I  find  I  shan't  be  able 
to  go  along  with  you  now,  but  I'll  join  you  for  the 
last  act." 

"  Oh,  rot !  "  said  Graham.  "  What's  up?  Betty'll 
be  awfully  upset." 

"  No,  she  won't,"  said  Peter.  "  I'm  going  to  send 
her  a  note."  And  while  the  others  were  getting  ready, 
he  dashed  off  a  few  lines  to  the  girl  who,  like  himself, 
understood  the  family  feeling.  It  contained  only  a 


i68        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

few  lines,  but  they  were  characteristically  Peterish 
and  were  calculated  to  make  Betty  add  one  more  brick 
to  the  beautiful  construction  of  her  love  for  him,  be- 
cause they  showed  that  he  understood  women  and 
their  sensitiveness  and  realized  their  urgent  need  of 
tenderness  and  appreciation. 

As  soon  as  the  party  had  driven  away,  Peter  col- 
lected a  pipe  and  a  tin  of  tobacco  and  went  quickly 
up  the  wide  staircase.  He  rushed  into  his  mother's 
own  particular  room  with  all  his  old  impetuosity  and 
found  her  sitting  at  a  table  by  the  side  of  a  great  work- 
basket  in  which  he  saw  a  large  collection  of  the  socks 
that  he  had  brought  home  with  him  and  which  stood 
badly  in  need  of  motherly  attention.  No  man  in  this 
world  made  so  many  or  such  quick  holes  in  the  toes 
of  his  socks  as  Peter  did,  and  he  knew  that  she  had 
ransacked  the  drawers  to  find  them.  He  drew  up  a 
chair,  thrust  his  long  legs  out  in  front  of  him  and  made 
himself  completely  comfortable. 

This  little  room  was  unlike  any  other  in  the  house. 
In  it  his  mother  had  placed  all  the  pet  pieces  of  inex- 
pensive furniture  which  had  been  in  the  sitting-room 
of  the  little  house  in  which  she  and  the  Doctor  had 
settled  down  when  they  were  first  married.  It  was 
unpretentious  stuff,  bought  in  a  cheap  store  in  a  small 
town, —  what  is  called  "  Mission  "  furniture, —  curi- 
ous, uncomfortable-looking  chairs  which  creaked  with 
every  movement,  odd  little  sideboards,  which  would 
have  brought  a  grin  either  of  pain  or  amusement  to 
the  face  of  the  former  owner  of  the  beautifully  fur- 
nished house  which  had  been  left  to  the  Doctor.  The 


THE  CITY  169 

walls  were  covered  with  photographs  of  the  family  in 
all  stages, —  Peter  as  a  chubby  baby  with  a  great  curl 
on  top  of  his  head  —  Belle  in  a  perambulator  smiling 
widely  at  a  colored  nurse  —  Graham  in  his  first  sailor- 
suit  —  Ethel  bravely  arrayed  in  a  party  frock, 
"  Thinking  of  Mother  " —  and  over  the  mantel-piece 
one  —  an  enlargement  —  of  the  Doctor  taken  when  he 
was  a  young  man,  with  an  unlined  face  and  thick, 
straight  hair,  his  jaws  set  with  that  grim  determina- 
tion which  had  carried  him  over  so  many  obstacles. 
It  was  a  room  at  which  Graham,  Belle  and  Ethel  fre- 
quently laughed.  But  Peter  liked  it  and  respected  it. 
He  felt  more  at  home  there  than  anywhere  else  in  the 
house.  It  reminded  him  of  the  early  struggles  of  his 
father  and  mother  and  touched  every  responsive  note 
in  his  nature. 

"  I'm  sorry  you're  not  going  to  the  theatre,  dear," 
said  Mrs.  Guthrie. 

"  No,  you're  not,"  said  Peter. 

"  Oh,  indeed  I  am.  I  like  you  to  enjoy  yourself 
with  the  others,  and  Betty'll  be  there.  Only  stay  a 
few  minutes;  and,  as  the  curtain  always  goes  up  late, 
you'll  be  in  time  to  see  the  whole  of  the  play." 

"  Blow  the  play !  "  said  Peter.  "  I'm  going  to  talk 
to  you  just  as  long  as  I  like.  I  can  go  to  the  theatre 
any  night  of  the  week." 

Mrs.  Guthrie  dropped  her  work,  bent  forward  and 
put  her  cheek  against  Peter's.  "  You're  a  dear,  dear 
boy,"  she  said.  "  You're  my  very  own  Peter,  and 
even  if  I  were  a  poet  I  couldn't  find  words  to  tell  you 
how  happy  you  make  me ;  but  I  did  my  best  not  to  let 


170       THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

you  see  that  I  was  just  a  wee  bit  hurt  because  you 
haven't  had  time  to  spare  me  a  few  moments  since  you 
came  home.  After  all,  I'm  only  a  little  old  mother 
now,  and  I  must  try  to  remember  that." 

"  Oh,  don't,"  said  Peter.  "  I'm  awfully  sorry  I've 
been  such  a  thoughtless  brute.  But,  no  one  —  no, 
no  one  —  can  ever  take  your  place,  and  you  know  it." 
He  went  down  on  his  knees  at  her  side  and  wrapped  his 
strong  arms  round  her  and  put  his  head  upon  her 
breast  as  he  used  to  do  when  he  was  a  little  chap,  and 
remained  there  for  a  while  perfectly  happy. 

He  couldn't  see  the  Madonna  look  which  came  into 
the  eyes  of  the  little  mother,  whose  pillow  had  fre- 
quently been  wet  with  tears  at  the  thought  that  she 
had  lost  her  boy.  Nor  did  he  see  the  expression  of 
extreme  gratitude  which  spread  rather  pathetically  over 
her  face.  But  he  felt  these  things  and  held  her  tightly 
just  to  show  how  well  he  understood,  and  to  eliminate 
from  her  heart  that  feeling  of  pain  which  he  knew 
had  crept  into  it  because  he  had  found  that  other  little 
mother  who  was  to  be  his  wife  and  have  sons  of  her 
own. 

Presently  he  returned  to  his  chair  and  to  his  pipe, 
and  began  to  talk.  "  By  gad !  "  he  said,  "  it's  good  to 
be  home  again.  I  find  myself  looking  at  everything 
differently  now  —  quite  time,  too.  I  should  have  been 
at  work  years  ago.  Universities  are  great  places  and 
1  shall  never  regret  Oxford,  but  they  take  a  long  time 
to  prepare  a  fellow  to  become  a  man."  Then  he 
laughed  one  of  his  great  and  big  laughs,  and  his  chair 
creaked  and  one  or  two  of  the  old  pieces  of  furniture 


THE  CITY  171 

seemed  to  rattle.  "  I  hid  those  socks,  but  I  knew  you'd 
find  them.  What  a  mother  you  are,  mother!  I'll 
make  a  bet  with  you." 

"  I  never  bet,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie,  who  was  all  smiles. 

"  I'll  bet  you  a  hundred  dollars  you  never  mend 
Graham's  socks.  Now  then  tell  the  truth." 

"  Well,  no,  I  don't.  He  doesn't  like  socks  that  have 
been  mended;  and,  anyway,  he  isn't  my  first-born. 
You  see  that  makes  a  lot  of  difference." 

"  There  you  are,"  said  Peter.  "  Pay  up  and  smile. 
Oh,  say ;  I'm  sorry  father's  seedy.  He  sticks  too  closely 
to  those  microbes  of  his.  I  shall  try  to  screw  up  cour- 
age and  take  him  on  a  bust  now  and  then.  It'll  do 
him  good.  Think  he'll  go  ?  " 

Mrs.  Guthrie  looked  up  eagerly.  "  Try,"  she  said. 
"  Please  do  try.  Now  that  you've  come  home  for 
good  I  want  you  to  do  everything  you  can  to  get  closer 
to  your  father.  He's  a  splendid  man  and  he's  always 
thinking  about  you  and  the  others,  but  I  know  that 
he'll  never  make  the  first  move.  He  doesn't  seem  to 
understand  how  to  do  it.  But  he  deserves  everything 
you  can  give  him.  If  only  you  could  break  down  his 
shyness  and  diffidence, —  because  that's  what  it  is, — 
you'd  make  him  very  happy." 

"  Yes,  that's  what  I  think,"  said  Peter.  "  I've  been 
thinking  it  over,  especially  since  I  saw  the  way  in 
which  Kenyon's  father  treats  him.  I  shall  pluck  up 
courage  one  of  these  nights,  beard  him  in  his  den  and 
have  it  out,  and  put  things  straight.  I  want  him  much 
more  than  he  wants  me ;  and,  d'you  know,  I  think  that 
Graham  wants  him  too," 


172        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  I'm  sure  he  does,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie.  "  Gra- 
ham's a  good  boy,  but  he's  very  reckless  and  thinks  that 
he's  older  than  he  is.  He  comes  to  me  sometimes  with 
his  troubles,  but  how  can  I  help  him?  I  wish,  Peter, 
I  do  wish  that  he'd  go  sometimes  to  his  father ! " 

"  Well,  I'm  going  to  try  to  alter  all  that,"  said  Peter. 
"  It's  got  to  be  done  somehow.  Father's  always  been 
afraid  of  us,  and  we've  always  been  afraid  of  father. 
It's  silly.  What  d'you  think  of  Nicholas?  Isn't  he 
a  corker  ?  " 

Mrs.  Guthrie  smiled.  "  He  improves  on  acquaint- 
ance," she  said.  "  He's  certainly  one  of  the  most 
charming  men  I've  ever  met.  Do  you  think  " —  she 
lowered  her  voice  a  little  — "  do  you  think  there's  any- 
thing between  him  and  Belle  ?  " 

"  Good  Lord !  "  said  Peter.  "  I  never  thought  of 
that.  Is  there?" 

"  Well,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie,  "  I've  noticed  one  or 
two  little  things.  He's  been  writing  to  her,  you 
know." 

"  Has  he  ?  By  Jove !  Well,  then,  there  must  be 
something  in  it.  He's  a  lazy  beggar  and  I  don't  be- 
lieve I've  ever  seen  him  write  a  letter  in  his  life.  Gee, 
I  shall  be  awfully  glad  to  have  him  for  a  brother-in- 
law  !  That  topping  place  in  Shropshire !  Belle  would 
make  an  absolutely  perfect  mistress  of  it,  although 
there's  plenty  of  life  in  the  old  man  yet.  By  Jove, 
it  was  good  to  see  the  relationship  between  Nick  and 
his  father.  It  staggered  me.  Why,  they  were  as 
good  as  friends.  They  go  about  arm  in  arm  and  tell 
each  other  everything.  It  used  to  make  me  feel  quite 


THE  CITY  173 

sick  sometimes.  Think  of  my  going  about  arm  in 
arm  with  father !  " 

"  Think  of  Belle  becoming  the  Countess  of  Shrop- 
shire! I  should  like  that.  It  would  be  another 
feather  in  your  father's  cap, —  your  father  who  used 
to  carry  siphons  in  a  basket." 

"  More  power  to  his  elbow,"  said  Peter.  "  It  might 
have  been  better  for  me  if  I'd  carried  siphons  in  a 
basket.  After  all,  I'm  inclined  to  believe  that  there's 
no  university  in  the  world  like  the  streets.  Think  of 
all  the  men  who've  graduated  from  windy  corners  and 
muddy  gutters  —  It'd  be  a  fine  thing  for  Ethel,  too, 
if  Belle  marries  Nick.  Isn't  she  an  extraordinary 
kid?  Upon  my  word,  she  takes  my  breath  away. 
She's  older  at  sixteen  than  most  women  are  at  thirty. 
By  the  way,  what's  the  matter  with  her?  What's 
anaemia,  anyhow?  She  looks  as  fit  as  a  fiddle." 

"  Oh,  she'll  soon  get  over  that,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie. 
"  I  think  they  bend  too  much  over  books  at  her  school. 
You  know  the  modern  girl  isn't  like  the  girls  of  my 
generation.  I  didn't  have  to  learn  geometry  or  piano 
playing.  I  didn't  think  it  was  necessary  to  know  Eu- 
clid or  a  smattering  of  the  classics.  We  learned  how 
to  make  bread  and  cook  a  good  steak  and  iron  clothes. 
You  know  husbands  don't  come  home  to  hear  Mozart 
on  a  Baby  Grand  and  enter  into  discussions  about 
writers  with  crack-jaw  names." 

"  I  know, —  Ibsen,  Schopenhauer,  Hauptmann  and 
Tolstoy.  No;  they  don't  fill  a  hungry  tummie,  do 
they?" 

"  No,  indeed  they  don't,"  said  Mrs.  Guthrie.   "  And 


174       THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

that  reminds  me  that  I  must  go  and  give  your  father 
his  little  dose.  When  a  doctor  isn't  well  he  never  knows 
how  to  look  after  himself."  She  got  up  and  put  down 
her  work,  and  then  bent  over  Peter.  "  Thank  you  for 
coming  up  to-night,  my  dearest  boy.  I've  had  a  queer 
little  pain  in  my  heart  for  a  long  time,  but  you've  taken 
it  all  away.  Now  run  along  and  see  your  Betty,  and 
don't  worry  about  your  little  mother  any  longer." 

Peter  got  up  and  put  his  hands  on  his  mother's  shoul- 
ders. "Listen!"  he  said.  "I  love  you.  I  shall  al- 
ways love  you.  No  woman  shall  ever  come  between 
me  and  you."  And  he  caught  her  in  his  arms  and 
kissed  her. 

And  then  she  bustled  down-stairs  to  the  library, 
where  the  Doctor  was  taking  it  easy  for  once  and 
dipping  into  one  of  the  numerous  books  that  sur- 
rounded him.  There  was  a  smile  on  Mrs.  Guthrie's 
face  which  was  like  the  sun  on  an  autumn  morning. 

On  the  way  to  his  bedroom  Peter  passed  the  door  of 
Ethel's  room,  and  drew  up  short.  He  had  heard  her 
say  she  was  going  to  bed  early.  He  hadn't  had  many 
words  with  her  since  he  got  back.  So  he  decided  to 
go  in  and  wipe  off  that  debt,  too.  When  he  tried  to 
open  the  door  he  found  that  it  was  locked.  He  started 
a  devil's  tattoo  with  his  knuckles.  "  Are  you  there, 
Kid?"  he  shouted  out. 

The  answer  was  "  Yes." 

"  Well,  then,  open  the  door.  I  want  to  come 
in." 

After  a  moment  the  door  was  opened  and  Ethel 
stood  there  in  a  very  becoming  peignoir.  She  looked 


THE  CITY  175 

extremely  disconcerted  and  did  her  best  to  block  the 
way  into  the  room. 

But  that  wouldn't  do  for  Peter.  "What's  all 
this  ? "  he  asked.  "  We  lock  our  door  now,  do 
we?" 

"  Yes,  sometimes,"  said  Ethel.  "  Why  aren't  you 
at  the  theatre  ?  "  She  shot  a  surreptitious  glance  to- 
wards the  window,  which  was  open. 

"  I've  been  having  a  talk  with  mother,"  said  Peter. 
"  Hello !  I  see  you've  been  trigging  up  your  room. 
Frightfully  swagger  now,  isn't  it.  New  art,  eh? 
You're  coming  on,  my  dear,  there's  no  mistake  about 
that.  I'm  afraid  you  find  us  all  appallingly  provincial, 
don't  you?" 

The  broad  grin  on  Peter's  face  was  no  new  thing  to 
Ethel.  He  had  always  pulled  her  leg  and  treated  her 
as  though  she  were  a  sort  of  freak.  All  the  same,  she 
liked  his  coming  in  and  was  flattered  to  know  that  he 
thought  it  worth  while  to  bother  about  her.  But  she 
began  to  edge  him  to  the  door.  He  had  come  at  a 
most  unpropitious  moment. 

"  Oh  ho !  "  said  Peter.  "  So  this's  what  higher  edu- 
cation does  for  you  ?  A  nice  mixture  —  cigarettes  and 
candies  —  I  must  say.  Now  I  know  why  you  locked 
your  door.  With  a  marshmallow  in  one  hand  and  an 
Egyptian  Beauty  in  the  other  you  lie  on  your  sofa  in 
the  latest  thing  in  peignoirs  and  see  life  through  the 
pages  of, —  what  ?  "  He  picked  up  a  book  from  the 
table.  "  Good  Lord !  "  he  added ;  "  you  don't  mean 
to  say  you  stuff  this  piffle  into  you  ?  "  It  was  a  col- 
lection of  plays  by  Strinberg. 


1 76        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Oh,  go  to  the  theatre !  "  said  Ethel.  "  You're  be- 
ing horridly  Oxford  now  and  I  hate  it." 

"  You'll  get  a  lot  more  of  it  before  I've  done  with 
you,"  said  Peter.  "  All  the  same,  you  look  very  nice, 
my  dear.  I'm  very  proud  of  you,  and  I  hope  you  will 
do  me  the  honour  to  be  seen  about  with  me  sometimes. 
But  how  about  taking  some  of  that  powder  off  your 
nose?  If  you  begin  trying  to  hide  it  at  sixteen  it'll 
be  lost  altogether  at  twenty."  He  made  a  sudden 
pounce  at  her  and  holding  both  her  hands  so  that  she 
could  not  scratch,  rubbed  all  the  powder  away  from  her 
little  proud  nose  and  made  for  the  door,  just  missing 
the  cushion  which  came  flying  after  him,  and  took 
himself  and  his  big  laugh  along  the  passage. 

Immensely  relieved  at  being  left  alone,  Ethel  locked 
the  door  again  and  went  over  to  her  dressing-table, 
where  she  repaired  damage  with  quick,  deft  fingers. 
With  another  glance  at  the  window, —  a  glance  in 
which  there  was  some  impatience, —  she  arranged  her- 
self on  the  settee  to  wait. 


IX 

No  wonder  Peter  had  made  remarks  about  this 
room.  It  was  deliciously  characteristic  of  its  owner. 
Large  and  airy;  all  its  furniture  was  white  and  its 
hangings  were  of  creamy  cretonne  covered  with  little 
rosebuds.  The  narrow  bed  was  tucked  away  in  a  cor- 
ner so  that  the  writing-desk,  the  sofa  and  the  revolv- 
ing book-stand  —  on  which  stood  a  bowl  of  mammoth 


THE  CITY  177 

chrysanthemums  —  might  dominate  the  room.  Sev- 
eral mezzotints  of  Watts'  pictures  hung  on  the  walls 
and  a  collection  of  framed  illustrations  of  the  Arabian 
Nights,  by  Dulac.  The  whole  effect  was  one  of  naive 
sophistication. 

Through  the  open  window  the  various  sounds  of  the 
city's  activity  floated  rather  pleasantly.  There  was 
even  a  note  of  cheerfulness  in  the  insistent  bells  of  the 
trolley-cars  on  Madison  Avenue  and  the  chugging  of 
a  taxi-cab  on  the  other  side  of  the  street.  Before 
many  minutes  had  gone  by  a  rope  ladder  dangled  out- 
side the  window,  and  this  was  followed  immediately 
afterwards  by  the  lithe  and  wiry  figure  of  a  boy.  Wear- 
ing a  rather  sheepish  expression  he  remained  sitting 
on  the  sill,  swinging  his  legs.  "Hello!"  said  he. 
"  How  are  you  feeling?  " 

"  There's  some  improvement  to-night,"  said  Ethel. 
"  Won't  you  come  in  ?  Were  you  waiting  for  a  sig- 
nal?" 

"You  bet!" 

He  was  a  nice  boy,  with  a  frank,  honest  face,  a  blunt 
nose  and  a  laughing  mouth.  His  hair  was  dark  and 
thick,  and  his  shoulders  square.  He  was  eighteen  and 
he  looked  every  day  of  it.  He  lived  next  door  and 
was  the  son  of  a  man  who  owned  a  line  of  steamships 
and  a  French  mother,  who  was  not  on  speaking  terms 
with  Mrs.  Guthrie,  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  Doctor 
had  been  obliged  to  remonstrate  about  her  parrot. 
This  expensive  prodigy  gave  the  most  lifelike  and 
frequent  imitations  of  cats,  trolley-cars,  newsboys, 
sirens  and  other  superfluous  and  distressing  disturb- 


THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ances  on  the  window-sill  of  the  room  which  was  next 
to  his  laboratory.  So  this  boy  and  girl  —  uncon- 
sciously playing  all  over  again  the  story  of  the  Mon- 
tagues and  Capulets  —  met  surreptitiously  night  after 
night,  the  boy  coming  over  the  roof  and  using  the  rope 
ladder  —  which  had  played  its  part  in  all  the  great 
romances.  Was  there  any  harm  in  him?  Well,  he 
was  eighteen. 

"  What'll  you  have  first?  "  asked  Ethel,  in  her  best 
hostess  manner — "candies  or  cigarettes?" 

"  Both,"  said  the  boy ;  and  with  a  lump  in  his  cheek 
and  an  expression  of  admiration  in  both  eyes  he 
started  a  cigarette.  He  was  about  to  sit  on  the  settee 
at  Ethel's  feet,  but  she  pointed  to  a  chair  and  into  this 
he  subsided,  crossing  one  leg  over  the  other  and  hitch- 
ing his  trousers  rather  high  so  that  he  might  display 
to  full  advantage  a  pair  of  very  smart  socks,  newly 
purchased. 

"  I  hope  you  locked  your  bedroom  door,"  said 
Ethel,  "  and  please  don't  forget  to  whisper.  There's 
no  chance  of  our  being  caught,  but  we  may  as  well  be 
careful." 

The  boy  nodded  and  made  a  little  face.  "If  father 
found  out  about  this,"  he  said ;  "  oh,  Gee !  What 
did  you  do  with  Ellen  after  she  bounced  in  last  night?  " 

"  Oh,  I  gave  her  one  of  my  hats.  I  told  her  that  if 
she  kept  quiet  there  was  a  frock  waiting  for  her.  She's 
safe.  Now,  amuse  me !  " 

For  some  minutes  the  boy  remained  silent,  worry- 
ing his  brain  as  to  how  to  comply  with  the  girl's  rather 
difficult  and  peremptory  request.  He  knew  that  she 


THE  CITY  179 

was  not  easy  to  amuse.  He  was  a  little  frightened 
at  the  books  she  read  and  looked  up  to  her  with  a 
certain  amount  of  awe.  He  liked  her  best  when  she 
said  nothing  and  was  content  to  sit  quite  quiet  and 
look  pretty.  After  deep  and  steady  thought  he  took 
a  chance.  "Do  you  know  this  one?"  he  asked,  and 
started  whistling  a  new  ragtime  through  his  teeth. 

It  was  new  to  Ethel.  She  liked  it.  Its  rhythm  set 
her  feet  moving.  "  Oh,  that's  fine,"  she  said. 
"What  are  the  words?" 

The  boy  was  a  gentleman.  He  shook  his  head, 
thereby  stimulating  her  curiosity  a  hundred-fold. 

"  Oh  don't  be  silly.  I  shall  know  them  sooner  or 
later,  whatever  they  are — 'besides,  I'm  not  a  child." 

The  boy  lied  chivalrously.  "  Well,  honestly,  I  don't 
know  them, —  something  about  *  Row,  row,  row ' —  I 
don't  know  the  rest." 

She  knew  that  he  did  know.  She  liked  him  for  not 
telling  her  the  truth,  but  she  made  a  mental  note  to  or- 
der the  song  the  following  morning. 

And  so,  for  about  an  hour,  these  two  young  things 
who  imagined  that  this  was  life  carried  on  a  desultory 
conversation,  while  the  boy  gradually  filled  the  room 
with  cigarette  smoke,  and  remained  reluctantly  a  whole 
yard  away  from  the  sofa.  It  was  all  very  childish  and 
simple,  but  to  them  it  was  romance  with  a  very  big  R. 
They  were  making  believe  that  they  had  thrown  the 
world  back  about  a  hundred  years  or  so.  He  was  a 
knight  and  she  a  lady  in  an  enemy's  castle;  and,  al- 
though their  mothers  didn't  speak,  they  liked  to  ignore 
the  fact  that  Mrs.  Guthrie  would  have  had  no  objec- 


i8o        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

tion  to  his  coming  to  tea  as  often  as  he  desired  and 
taking  Ethel  for  walks  in  broad  daylight  whenever  he 
wished  for  a  little  mild  exercise.  But, —  he  was 
eighteen,  and  so  presently,  repulsed  by  her  tongue  but 
enticed  by  her  eyes,  he  left  his  chair  and  found  himself 
sitting  on  the  settee  at  Ethel's  feet,  hold'  "^  her  hand, 
which  thrilled  him  very  much.  She  was  kinder  than 
usual  that  night,  sweeter  and  more  girlish.  Her 
stockings  were  awfully  pretty,  too,  and  her  hair  went 
into  more  than  usually  delicious  ripples  round  her 
face. 

"  You're  a  darling,"  he  said  suddenly.  "  I  love  to 
come  here  like  this.  I  hope  you'll  be  ill  for  a  month." 
And  he  slid  forward  with  gymnastic  clumsiness  and 
put  his  arm  round  her  shoulder.  He  was  just  going  to 
kiss  her  and  so  satisfy  an  overwhelming  craving  when 
there  was  a  soft  knock  on  the  door  and  Dr.  Guthrie's 
voice  followed  it.  "  Are  you  awake,  Ethel  ?  " 

The  boy  sprang  to  his  feet,  stood  for  a  moment  with 
a  look  of  peculiar  shame  on  his  face,  turned  on  his 
heels,  made  for  the  window,  went  through  it  like  a 
rabbit  and  up  the  troubadour  ladder,  which  disappeared 
after  him. 

Ethel  held  her  breath  and  remained  transfixed. 
Again  the  knock  came  and  the  question  was  repeated. 
But  she  made  no  answer,  and  presently,  when  the  sound 
of  footsteps  died  away,  she  got  up  —  a  little  peevish 
and  more  than  a  little  irritable  —  kicked  a  small  pile 
of  cigarette  ash  which  the  boy  had  dropped  upon  her 
carpet,  and  said  to  herself :  "  Just  as  he  was  going  to 
kiss  me !  Goodness,  how  annoying  father  is !  " 


THE  CITY  181 


X 

THE  following  morning  Belle  took  Nicholas  Ken- 
yon  for  a  walk.  Dressed  in  a  suit  of  blue  flannel  with 
white  bone  buttons,  with  a  pair  of  white  spats  gleam- 
ing over  patent  leather  shoes  and  a  grey  hat  stuck  at 
an  angle  of  forty-five,  Kenyon  looked  as  fresh  and  as 
dapper  as  though  he  had  been  to  bed  the  night  before 
at  ten  o'clock.  He  had,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  come  home 
with  the  milk ;  but  he  was  one  of  those  men  who  pos- 
sess the  enviable  gift  of  looking  healthy  and  untired 
after  the  sort  of  nights  which  make  the  ordinary  man 
turn  to  chemistry  and  vibro-massage. 

Belle  had  sported  a  new  hat  for  the  occasion. 

This  fact  Kenyon  realized  with  that  queer  touch  of 
intuition  which  was  characteristic  of  him.  "  By 
Jove !  "  he  said.  "  That's  something  like  a  hat,  Belle. 
Hearty  congratulations.  You  suit  it  to  perfection." 

Belle  beamed  upon  him.  "  But  you  would  say  that 
anyhow,  wouldn't  you?" 

"  Perfectly  true ;  but  in  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a 
hundred  I  shouldn't  mean  it." 

They  turned  into  Madison  Avenue.  It  was  an  ex- 
quisite morning.  The  whole  city  was  bathed  in  sun, 
but  the  refreshing  tang  of  late  autumn  was  in  the  air. 
Most  of  the  large  houses  were  still  closed,  their  own- 
ers lingering  in  the  country  or  abroad.  All  the  same 
there  was  the  inevitable  amount  of  traffic  in  the  streets 
and  apparently  the  usual  number  of  passers-by.  The 
city  can  be  —  according  to  the  strange  little  creatures 


182        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

who  write  society  news  — "  utterly  deserted  "  and  yet 
contain  all  its  teeming  millions. 

"  And  what  may  that  be  ?  "  asked  Kenyon,  pointing 
to  the  heavy  white  buttresses  of  a  church  which  backed 
on  the  street. 

"  Oh,  that's  the  Roman  Catholic  Cathedral." 

"  Roman  Catholic,  eh  ?  I  noticed  churches  every- 
where as  we  drove  up  from  the  docks, —  more  churches 
than  pubs  apparently,  and  yet  I  suppose  it  would  be 
quite  absurd  to  imagine  that  New  Yorkers  imbibe 
their  alcohol  entirely  in  the  form  of  religion." 

"  Quite,"  said  Belle,  dryly.  "  Although  we  have  a 
hundred  religions  and  only  five  cocktails." 

"  I  see  you  also  go  in  for  antique  furniture." 

Belle  laughed.  "  You  have  a  quick  eye,"  she  said. 
"  There's  so  much  genuine  Old  English  stuff  in  this 
city  that  if  it  were  sent  to  England  there  wouldn't 
be  room  for  it  on  shore.  Tell  me;  what  are  your 
plans?" 

"  Well,"  said  Kenyon,  "  I'm  going  to  accept  your 
father's  perfectly  charming  hospitality  for  a  fortnight 
and  then  take  rooms  in  a  bachelor  apartment-house,  of 
which  Graham  has  told  me,  for  the  winter." 

"  You're  going  to  settle  down  here  ?  "  cried  Belle. 

"  Rather, —  for  six  months.  I'm  here  to  study  the 
conditions,  make  myself  familiar  with  the  character- 
istics and  draw  from  both  what  I  hope  will  be  the 
foundations  of  much  usefulness."  Kenyon  consid- 
ered that  he  had  enveloped  his  true  mission  —  which 
was  to  lighten  the  pockets  of  all  unwary  young  men  — 
with  a  satirical  verbiage  that  did  him  credit, 


THE  CITY  183 

"  I  thought  that  perhaps  you'd  come  for  some  other 
reason,"  said  Belle,  whose  whole  face  showed  her  dis- 
appointment. 

Kenyon  shot  a  quick  glance  at  her.  How  naive 
she  was  —  how  very  much  too  easy  —  but,  neverthe- 
less, how  very  young  and  desirable.  "  That  goes  with- 
out saying,  you  delicious  thing,"  he  replied,  closing 
his  hand  warmly  round  her  arm  for  a  moment  and  so 
bringing  the  light  back  to  her \eyes.  "  By  the  way," 
he  continued,  "  what's  the  matter  with  Graham?  " 

"  I  don't  know  that  anything's  the  matter  with  Gra- 
ham." 

"  I  think  so.  I  notice  a  worried  look  about  him 
that  he  didn't  have  at  Oxford;  that  he  seems  to  be 
always  on  the  verge  of  telling  me  something,  and  draw- 
ing back  at  the  last  minute.  I  must  make  a  point  of 
finding  out  what  his  trouble  is.  Peter  and  I  were  dis- 
cussing it  this  morning  after  breakfast.  We're  both 
a  bit  anxious  about  him.  Do  you  know  if  your  father 
has  noticed  it?  " 

"  Father  ?  Oh,  he  doesn't  notice  anything.  He  be- 
lieves that  Graham  is  working  very  hard  and  doing 
well.  He  knows  less  about  what  goes  on  in  our  house 
than  the  people  who  live  next  door." 

"  That's  rather  a  pity.  I'm  all  for  complete  con- 
fidence between  father  and  son.  However,  I  shall 
play  father  to  Graham  for  a  bit  and  see  what  can  be 
done  for  him.  He  puzzles  me.  There's  a  mystery 
•somewhere." 

Something  of  this  mystery  was  disclosed  to  Ken- 
yon  and  Peter  that  night.  After  dining  them  both 


1 84        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

at  the  Harvard  Club  —  a  place  which  filled  Kenyon 
with  admiration  and  surprise  —  Graham  suddenly  sug- 
gested, with  a  queer  touch  of  excitement,  that  they 
should  go  with  him  to  his  apartment. 

"  Your  apartment  ?  "  said  Peter.  "  What  on  earth 
do  you  mean  ?  " 

"  Well,  come  and  see,"  said  Graham. 

The  two  elder  men  looked  at  each  other  in  amaze- 
ment. Kenyon's  quick  mind  ran  ahead,  but  Peter,  the 
unsophisticated,  was  quite  unable  to  understand  what 
in  the  world  Graham  wanted  an  apartment  for  when 
he  lived  at  home.  They  all  three  left  West  Forty- 
fourth  Street  in  silence  and  walked  arm  in  arm  down 
Fifth  Avenue  as  far  as  Twenty-eighth  Street.  Here 
they  turned  westward  and  followed  Graham,  who  was 
wearing  an  air  of  rather  sheepish  pride,  up  the  steps 
of  an  old  brown  stone  house  with  rather  a  shabby 
portico. 

"  Dismal  looking  hole,"  said  Peter. 

"  Wait !  "  said  Graham,  and  he  put  his  finger  on  a 
bell.  The  door  opened  automatically  and  he  led  the 
way  into  a  scantily  furnished  hall  and  up  three  flights 
of  stairs,  whose  red  carpet  was  in  the  autumn  of  its 
days.  Drawing  up  in  front  of  a  door  on  the  left  of 
the  passage  he  rang  again,  and  after  a  lengthy  pause 
was  admitted  to  a  small  apartment  by  a  colored  maid, 
who  gave  a  wide  grin  of  recognition. 

"  Come  right  in,"  said  Graham.  "  Lily,  take  our 
hats  and  coats.  Don't  leave  them  about  in  the  hall. 
Hang  them  up  and  then  go  and  get  some  drinks." 

Kenyon  looked  about  him  curiously.     He  could  see 


THE  CITY  185 

that  the  place  was  newly  furnished  and  that  everything 
had  been  chosen  by  a  man.  He  glanced  into  the  din- 
ing-room. The  pictures  were  sporting  and  the  furni- 
ture mission.  He  detected  no  sign  of  a  woman's  hand 
anywhere.  He  began  to  be  puzzled.  He  had  ex- 
pected to  find  something  quite  different.  But  when 
Graham  opened  the  door  of  the  sitting-room  and 
said :  "  Well,  here  we  are,  Ita !  "  and  he  saw  a  small, 
dark,  olive-skinned  girl  rise  up  from  a  settee  and  run 
forward  to  Graham  with  a  little  cry  of  welcome,  he 
knew  that  his  deduction  of  the  situation  had  been  a 
right  one.  So  this  was  the  mystery. 

Still  with  the  same  air  of  sheepish  pride,  Graham 
said :  "  Peter,  this  is  Miss  Ita  Strabosck.  My 
brother,  Ita.  And  this  is  Nicholas  Kenyon,  who's  a 
great  friend  of  mine.  They've  just  come  over  from 
England,  and  so  of  course  I've  brought  them  to  see 
you." 

The  little  girl  held  out  a  very  shy  hand,  and 
said :  "  I  am  so  glad.  Eet  ees  very  good  of  you  to 
come." 

In  a  curiously  plain  tight  frock  of  some  soft  black 
material,  cut  square  across  her  tiny  breasts,  and  leav- 
ing her  arms  bare  almost  to  the  shoulders,  she  stood, 
with  one  knee  bent,  looking  from  one  man  to  the  other 
with  a  sort  of  wistful  eagerness  to  be  treated  kindly. 
She  held  a  tiny  black  Teddy  bear  with  red  eyes  against 
her  cheek,  like  a  child. 

Peter,  for  a  reason  which  he  was  unable  to  explain 
to  himself,  felt  a  wave  of  sympathy  go  over  him.  He 
not  only  accepted  the  girl  on  her  face  value,  but  some- 


1 86        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

how  or  other  believed  her  to  be  younger  and  more  ro- 
mantic than  she  looked.  She  seemed  to  him  to  have 
stepped  out  of  the  pages  of  some  Arabian  book  —  to 
be  a  little  exotic  whom  Graham  must  have  discovered 
far  away  from  her  native  hot-house.  He  liked  the 
way  in  which  her  thick  hair  was  arranged  round  her 
face,  and  he  would  have  sworn  that  she  was  without 
guile. 

Not  so  Kenyon.  "  Great  Scott !  "  he  said  to  him- 
self. "  Here's  a  little  devil  for  you.  Our  young 
friend  Graham  has  had  his  leg  pulled.  I've  seen  mos- 
quitoes before,  but  the  poison  of  this  one  will  take  all 
the  ingenuity  of  an  expert  to  counteract." 

He  sat  down  and  watched  the  girl,  who  threw  one 
quick  antagonistic  glance  at  him  and  attached  herself 
to  Peter,  to  whom  she  talked  in  monosyllables.  She 
might  only  very  recently  have  left  a  Convent  School, 
except  that  her  dog-like  worship  of  Graham  seemed  to 
prove  that  she  owed  him  a  deep  debt  of  gratitude  for 
some  great  service. 

Graham  watched  her,  too,  and  his  expression  showed 
Kenyon  that  even  if  he  didn't  love  her  he  believed  in 
her  and  was  proud  of  himself. 


XI 

BY  a  sort  of  mutual  consent  the  three  men  left  the 
apartment  in  Twenty-eighth  Street  early.  They  did 
not  desire  to  finish  the  evening  at  any  cabaret  or  club. 
They  called  the  first  passing  taxicab  and  drove  home. 


THE  CITY  187 

By  mutual  consent  also  they  never  once  referred  to  Ita 
Strabosck,  but  discussed  everything  else  under  the  sun. 
Kenyon  had  never  been  so  useful.  With  consummate 
tact  —  but  all  the  while  with  the  picture  in  his  mind  of 
the  cunning  little  actress  whom  they  had  just  left  — 
he  led  the  conversation  from  dancing  to  baseball  and 
from  country  clubs  to  women's  clothes.  Whenever 
the  cab  passed  a  strong  light  Graham  made  a  quick, 
examining  glance  at  Peter's  face.  He  knew  old  Peter 
as  well  as  Peter  knew  his  piano,  and  he  was  quite  well 
aware  of  the  fact  that  although  his  brother  laughed  a 
good  deal  at  Kenyon's  quaint  turn  of  phrase  he  was 
upset  at  what  he  had  seen. 

It  was  just  after  eleven  o'clock  when  they  went  into 
the  smoking-room  of  the  house  in  Fifty-second  Street. 
Mrs.  Guthrie  and  Ethel  had  gone  to  bed.  Belle  had 
not  returned  from  a  theatre  party.  The  Doctor  was 
at  work  in  his  laboratory.  He  heard  the  boys  come 
in.  The  sound  of  their  voices  made  him  raise  his  head 
eagerly.  He  even  half-rose  from  his  chair  in  a  desire 
to  join  them  and  hear  them  talk,  and  laugh  with  them 
and  get  from  them  some  of  that  sense  of  youth  which 
they  exuded  so  pleasantly,  but  his  terrible  shyness  got 
the  better  of  him  once  more  and  he  returned  to  his  ex- 
periments. How  ironical  it  was  that  with  complete 
unconsciousness  he  was  leaving  it  to  such  a  man  as 
Nicholas  Kenyon  to  play  father  to  his  second  son,  who 
had  never  in  his  short  life  needed  a  real  father  so 
badly. 

For  some  little  time  —  smoking  a  good  cigar  with 
complete  appreciation  —  Kenyon  continued  to  give 


1 88        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

forth  his  impressions  of  New  York  so  far  as  he  knew 
it.  He  was  especially  amusing  in  his  description  of 
the  effect  upon  him  of  the  first  sight  of  the  Great 
White  Way.  Then,  all  of  a  sudden,  there  came  one  of 
those  strange  pauses.  It  was  Peter  who  broke  the 
silence.  "  Graham,  old  boy,"  he  said,  "  tell  us  about 
it.  What  does  it  all  mean  ?  Good  Lord !  you're  only 
twenty- four.  Are  you  married?" 

Before  Graham  could  reply,  Kenyon  sent  out  a  scoff- 
ing laugh.  "Married!  Is  he  married?"  he  cried. 
"  My  good  old  grandfather's  ghost,  Peter !  But  how 
indescribably  green  you  are.  Hang  me  if  you're 
not  like  a  sort  of  Peter  Pan !  You've  passed  through 
Harvard  and  Oxford  with  a  skin  over  your  eyes. 
It's  all  very  beautiful,  very  commendable  —  and  what 
Belle  would  call  'very  dear'  of  you  —  and  all  that 
sort  of  thing,  but  somehow  you  make  me  feel  that 
I've  got  to  go  through  life  with  you  in  the  capacity 
of  the  sort  of  guide  one  hires  in  Paris  —  the  human 
Baedeker." 

"  But  if  Graham  hasn't  married  that  poor  girl,"  said 
Peter,  bluntly,  "what's  he  doing  with  her?" 

Graham  sprang  to  his  feet  and  began  to  walk  about 
the  room.  All  about  his  tall,  slight,  well-built  figure 
there  was  a  curious  nervousness  and  excitement.  Even 
in  the  carefully  subdued  light  of  the  room  it  was  plain 
to  see  that  his  face  was  rather  haggard  and  drawn. 
The  boy  looked  years  older  than  Peter.  "  I'll  start 
off,"  he  said,  "  by  giving  you  fellows  my  word  of 
honor  that  what  I'm  going  to  tell  you  is  the  truth.  I 
have  to  begin  like  this  because  if  either  of  you  were 


THE  CITY  189 

to  tell  me  this  story  I  don't  think  I  should  be  able  to 
believe  it.  Some  time  ago  I  was  taken  —  I  forget  by 
whom  —  to  a  pestilential  but  rather  amusing  place  in 
Fortieth  Street.  It's  a  huge  studio  run  by  a  woman 
who  calls  herself  Papowsky.  It's  what  you,  Nick, 
would  call  the  last  word  in  supereffeteness.  Ita  Stra- 
bosck  was  one  of  the  girls.  I  liked  her  at  once.  I 
didn't  fall  in  love  with  her,  but  she  appealed  to  me  and 
it  was  simply  to  see  her  that  I  went  there  several  times. 
I  knew  the  place  was  pretty  rotten  and  I  didn't  cotton 
on  to  the  people  who  were  there  or  the  things  they  did. 
I  even  knew  that  the  police  had  their  eyes  on  it,  but 
I  liked  it  all  the  more  because  of  that.  It  gave  it  a 
sort  of  zest,  like  absinthe  in  whiskey." 
"  Quite !  "  said  Kenyon.  "  Fire  away !  " 
"  The  last  time  I  went  there,  Ita  took  me  into  a  cor- 
ner, told  me  that  she  was  never  allowed  out  of  the 
place  and  was  a  sort  of  White  Slave,  and  begged  me 
to  take  her  away.  I  don't  think  I  shall  ever  forget  the 
sight  of  that  poor  little  wretch  trembling  and  shaking. 
It  was  pretty  bad.  Well,  I  took  her  away.  I  got  her 
out  by  a  fire-escape  when  nobody  was  watching  us. 
Dodged  through  a  window  of  a  restaurant  on  the  first 
floor,  and  so  out  into  the  street.  It  was  very  tricky 
work.  The  day  after  I  took  the  apartment  that  you 
came  to  to-night,  furnished  it,  and  there  Ita  has  been 
ever  since.  I  go  there  nearly  every  night  until  the 
small  hours.  She's  happy  now  and  safe  and  I  don't 
regret  it.  She  hated  the  place  and  the  things  she  had 
been  forced  to  do  and  nothing  will  make  me  believe 
that  she  was  bad.  She  was  just  a  victim  —  that's  all. 


igo        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

And  if  I  have  to  go  without  things  I  don't  care  so  long 
as  she  has  all  she  needs.  That's  the  story.  What 
d'you  think  of  it?" 

Peter  got  up,  went  over  to  his  brother  and  held  out 
his  hand  silently.  With  a  rather  pathetic  expression 
of  gratitude  in  his  eyes,  Graham  took  it  and  held  it 
tight.  "That's  like  you,  Peter,"  he  said,  a  little 
huskily. 

Kenyon  made  no  movement.  He  looked  with  a 
pitying  smile  at  the  two  boys  as  they  stood  eye  to  eye. 
The  whole  thing  sounded  to  him  like  a  fairy  tale  and 
for  a  moment  he  wondered  whether  Graham  was  not 
endeavoring  to  obtain  their  sympathy  under  false  pre- 
tences. Then  he  made  up  his  mind  that  Graham  — 
like  the  man  with  whom  he  had  lived  at  Oxford  — 
was  green  also,  for  all  that  he  had  knocked  about  in 
New  York  for  two  years.  Not  from  any  kindness  of 
heart,  but  simply  because  he  wanted  to  use  Graham 
as  a  means  of  introducing  him  to  the  young  male 
wealthy  set  of  the  city,  he  determined  to  get  him  out 
somehow  or  other  of  this  disastrous  entanglement. 
He  would  however  go  to  work  tactfully  without  al- 
lowing Graham  to  think  that  he  had  made  a  complete 
fool  of  himself.  He  knew  that  if  he  wounded  this  boy's 
vanity  and  brought  him  down  from  his  heroic  pedestal 
he  would  set  his  teeth,  put  his  back  to  the  wall  and  re- 
fuse to  be  assisted.  With  keen  insight  he  could  see 
that  this  incident  was  likely  to  injure  the  usefulness  of 
his  visit  to  America. 

"Urn!"  he  said.  "It's  a  pitiful  story,  Graham. 
You  behaved  devilish  well,  old  boy.  Not  many  men 


THE  CITY  191 

would  have  acted  so  quickly  and  so  unselfishly.  Now, 
sit  down  and  tell  me  a  few  things." 

Gladly  enough  Graham  did  so,  heaving  a  great  sigh. 
He  was  glad  that  he  had  made  a  clear  breast  of  all 
this.  He  was  too  young  to  keep  it  a  secret.  He 
wanted  sympathy  urgently  and  a  little  human  help. 
Peter  loaded  and  lit  a  pipe  and  drew  his  chair  into  the 
group. 

"  This  girl  Ita  What's-her-name  loves  you,  of 
course?  " 

Graham  nodded. 

"  Anyone  could  see  that,"  said  Peter. 

"  But  she'd  been  in  that  studio  some  time  before 
you  came  along,  I  take  it, —  I  mean  she'd  been  any- 
body's property  for  the  asking?  " 

Graham  shuddered.  "  I  hate  to  think  so,"  he 
said. 

Peter  kicked  the  leg  of  the  nearest  chair. 

"  How  d'you  feel  ?  "  asked  Kenyon. 

"  Awfully  sorry  for  her,"  said  Graham. 

"  Yes,  of  course.  What  I  mean  is,  are  you  all 
right?" 

Graham  looked  puzzled.  "  I  find  it  rather  difficult 
to  pay  for  everything,"  he  said,  "especially  as  I've 
been  damned  unlucky  lately." 

The  man  of  the  world  involuntarily  raised  his  eye- 
brows. "  Good  Lord !  "  he  said  to  himself.  "  And 
this  boy  is  the  son  of  a  specialist.  Blind  —  blind !  " 
Then  he  spoke  aloud,  passing  on  to  another  point. 
"  How  long  do  you  think  it  is  incumbent  upon  you  to 
make  yourself  the  guardian  of  this  girl  ?  " 


192        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Graham  shrugged  his  shoulders.  "  She  comes  from 
Poland.  Her  father  and  mother  are  dead  and  she  has 
no  one  to  look  after  her." 

"  I'll  help  you,"  said  Peter. 

That  was  exactly  what  Kenyon  didn't  want.  He 
got  up,  went  over  to  the  table  and  mixed  a  drink. 
"  Potter  off  to  bed,  Graham,  old  boy,"  he  said.  "  Get 
a  good  night's  rest.  You  need  it.  We'll  go  further 
into  the  matter  in  a  day  or  two.  It  requires  serious 
consideration.  Anyway,  I  congratulate  you.  You're 
a  bit  of  a  knight,  and  you've  my  complete  admiration." 
He  led  the  boy  to  the  door,  patted  him  on  the  shoulder 
and  got  rid  of  him.  Then  he  returned  to  Peter,  whose 
face  showed  that  he  was  laboring  under  many  conflict- 
ing emotions. 

"  Nick,"  he  said,  "  he's  only  twenty- four  —  just 
making  a  beginning.  He  did  the  only  thing  he  could 
do  under  the  circumstances,  but, —  but  what  would 
father  say?" 

"  I  don't  think  it's  a  question  as  to  what  your  father 
would  say,"  said  Kenyon.  "  If  I  know  anything,  the 
way  to  put  it  is  what  can  your  father  do?  Of  all  men 
in  the  city  he's  the  one  who  could  be  most  useful  in 
this  peculiar  mess-up  —  Peter,  you  and  I  have  got 
to  get  that  boy  out  of  this,  otherwise " 

"Otherwise  what?" 

"  Otherwise  —  quite  shortly  —  the  police  are  likely 
to  fish  out  of  the  river  the  dead  body  of  a  promising 
lad  of  twenty-four,  and  there'll  be  great  grief  in  this 
house." 

"What  d'you  mean?" 


THE  CITY  193 

"  Exactly  what  I  say.  That  girl's  a  liar,  a  cheat 
and  a  fraud." 

"  I  don't  believe  you." 

"  I  don't  care  whether  you  believe  me  or  not.  She's 
rotten  from  head  to  foot.  She's  as  easy  to  read  as  an 
advertisement.  She's  taking  advantage  of  a  fellow 
who's  as  unsuspicious  as  you  are.  You're  both  green, 
—  green,  I  tell  you, —  as  green  as  grass." 

"  I'd  rather  be  green,"  cried  Peter,  hotly,  "  than  go 
through  life  with  your  rotten  skepticism." 

"Would  you?  You  talk  like  an  infant.  Graham 
will  want  to  marry  some  day, —  and  then  what  ?  Good 
Heavens!  Hasn't  anybody  taken  the  trouble  to  tell 
you  two  any  of  the  facts  of  life?  You  are  neither  of 
you  fit  to  be  allowed  out  in  the  streets  without  a  nurse. 
It's  appalling.  Skeptical,  you  call  me.  You're  blind, 
I  tell  you.  Blind !  So's  the  old  man  in  the  next  room. 
There's  an  ugly  shadow  over  this  house,  Peter,  as 
sure  as  you're  alive.  Don't  stand  there  glaring  at  me. 
I'm  talking  facts.  If  you've  got  any  regard  for  your 
brother  and  his  health  and  his  future;  if  you  want  to 
save  your  mother  from  unutterable  suffering  and  your 
father  from  a  hideous  awakening,  don't  talk  any  fur- 
ther drivel  to  me,  but  make  up  your  mind  that  the 
girl,  Ita  Strasbosck,  has  it  in  her  power  to  turn  Graham 
into  a  suicide.  She's  a  liar  —  a  liar  and  a  trickster  and 
a  menace  —  and  I'll  make  it  my  business  to  prove  it  to 
you  and  Graham." 

"  You  can't." 

"  Can't  I  ?  We'll  see  about  that.  And  you've  got 
to  help  me.  We've  got  to  make  Graham  see  that  he 


194        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN  , 

must  shake  her  off  at  once, —  at  once,  I  tell  you.  The 
alternative  you  know." 

Peter  got  up  and  strode  about  the  room.  He  was 
worried  and  anxious.  He  didn't,  unfortunately,  fully 
appreciate  the  gravity  of  this  affair,  because,  as  Ken- 
yon  had  said  so  tauntingly,  he  was  a  child  in  such  mat- 
ters. But  what  he  did  appreciate  was  that  his  only 
brother  had  done  something,  however  sympathetic  the 
motive,  which  might  have  far-reaching  consequences 
and  which  did  away  with  the  possibility  of  his  going, 
as  it  was  Peter's  determination  to  go,  clean  and 
straight  to  a  good  girl. 

He  turned  to  Kenyon,  who  had  made  himself  com- 
fortable. "  I'll  help  you  for  all  I'm  worth,  Nick,"  he 
said. 

"  Right,"  said  Kenyon.  "  I'll  think  out  a  line  of  ac- 
tion and  let  you  know  to-morrow.  There's  no  time  to 
be  lost." 

XII 

KENYON  got  rid  of  Peter,  too. 

Apart  from  the  fact  that  he  was  going  to  wait  up 
for  Belle,  he  wanted  to  be  alone.  He  was  angry.  It 
was  just  like  his  bad  luck  to  come  all  the  way  to 
America  and  find  that  the  two  men  who  had  it  in  their 
power  to  be  of  substantial  use  to  him  were  both  fully 
occupied, —  one  being  hopelessly  in  love,  the  other  in 
money  trouble  and  in  what  he  recognized  as  a  difficult 
and  even  dangerous  position.  With  characteristic 
selfishness  he  resented  these  things.  They  made  it 


THE  CITY  195 

necessary  for  him  to  exercise  his  brain, —  not  for  him- 
self—which was  his  idea  of  the  whole  art  of  living 
—  but  for  others.  There  were  other  things  that  he 
resented  also.  One  was  the  fact  that  Peter  was  what 
he  called  a  damned  child.  He  had  no  admiration  what- 
ever for  his  friend's  absolute  determination  to  look 
only  at  the  clean  things  of  life.  A  thousand  times 
since  they  had  shared  the  same  rooms  he  had  cursed 
Peter  because  of  his  sweeping  refusal  to  discuss  a 
question  which  he  knew  to  be  of  vital  and  far-reaching 
importance.  At  these  times  Peter  had  always  said 
something  like  this :  "  My  dear  Nick,  I'm  not  going 
to  be  a  doctor,  a  woman-hunter,  or  a  sloppy  man  about 
town.  I  don't  want  to  know  any  details  whatever  of 
the  things  which  stir  up  other  men's  curiosity.  I've 
no  room  in  my  brain  for  them.  They  don't  amuse  me 
or  interest  me.  I'm  jolly  well  going  to  remain  a 
damned  child,  whether  you  like  it  or  not,  so  you  may 
chuck  trying  to  drag  me  into  these  midnight  discus- 
sions of  yours  with  the  men  who  hang  nudes  all  over 
their  walls  and  gloat  over  filthy  little  French 
books." 

And  then  there  was  Graham.  He,  like  untold  hun- 
dreds of  his  type,  had  a  certain  amount  of  precocity, 
but  no  knowledge.  He  had  merely  peeked  at  the  truth 
of  things  through  a  chink.  He  had  looked  at  life  with 
the  salacious  eyes  of  a  Peeping  Tom.  And  what  was 
the  result  ?  Worse  than  total  ignorance.  Deep  down 
in  whatever  soul  he  had,  Nicholas  Kenyon  honestly 
and  truly  believed  in  friendship  between  father  and 
son.  He  knew  —  none  better  —  because  it  was  his 


196        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

business  to  observe,  that  a  young  man  was  frightfully 
and  terribly  handicapped  who  went  out  into  the  world 
unwarned,  unadvised  and  uninitiated.  He  had  often 
come  across  men  like  Peter  and  Graham  whose  lives 
had  been  absolutely  ruined  at  the  very  outset  for  the 
reason  that  their  fathers  had  either  been  too  cowardly 
or  too  indifferent  to  give  them  the  benefit  of  their  own 
experience  and  early  troubles.  In  fact,  most  of  the 
men  he  knew  —  and  he  knew  a  great  many  —  had 
been  left  to  discover  the  essential  truths  and  facts  for 
themselves.  The  inevitable  end  of  it  was  that  they 
made  their  discoveries  too  late. 

Fate  certainly  must  have  had  a  very  grim  amuse- 
ment in  watching  Nicholas  Kenyon  as  he  walked  up 
and  down  the  library  of  Dr.  Hunter  Guthrie's  house 
that  night,  blazing  at  the  delinquencies  of  fathers. 
Nevertheless,  Kenyon  had  the  right  to  be  indignant, 
whether  his  reasons  for  being  so  sprang  out  of  his 
selfishness  or  not  His  own  father  was  an  unscrupu- 
lous, unserious  man,  that  was  true,  but  at  any  rate  he 
had  given  his  son  a  human  chance.  He  could  take  it 
or  leave  it  as  he  liked.  And  when  Kenyon,  piecing 
together  all  that  he  had  heard  of  Dr.  Guthrie  from 
Peter,  from  Graham  and  from  Belle,  added  all  that 
to  the  very  obvious  fact  that  these  two  boys  were  out 
in  the  world  with  blind  eyes,  he  burst  into  a  scoffing 
laugh.  In  his  mind's  eye  he  could  see  the  excellent 
and  distinguished  Doctor  rounding  his  back  over  ex- 
periments for  the  benefit  of  humanity,  while  he  utterly 
neglected  to  give  two  of  the  human  beings  for  whom 
he  was  responsible  the  few  words  of  advice  which 


THE  CITY  197 

would  render  it  unnecessary  for  them  to  become  his 
patients. 

If  Kenyon  had  been  a  more  generous  man  —  if  in 
his  nature  there  had  been  one  small  grain  of  unselfish- 
ness—  he  would  have  gone  at  that  very  moment, 
then  and  there,  to  the  door  of  the  Doctor's  laboratory 
—  into  that  wonderful  room  —  sat  down  opposite  the 
man  who  spent  his  life  in  it  with  such  noble  concentra- 
tion and  begged  him  to  desert  his  microbes  and  turn 
his  attention  to  his  sons.  As  it  was  he  neglected  to 
take  an  opportunity  which  would  have  enabled  the  re- 
cording angel  to  make  one  very  good  entry  on  the 
blank  credit  side  of  his  account,  and  concentrated  upon 
a  way  in  which  he  could  use  Peter  and  Graham  for  his 
own  material  ends.  He  was  immediately  faced  there- 
fore with  two  "jobs,"  as  he  called  them, —  one  to 
queer  Peter's  engagement  with  Betty,  in  order  that  he 
might  achieve  his  friend's  whole  attention,  the  other 
to  lift  Graham  out  of  his  ghastly  entanglement,  for 
the  same  purpose.  Bringing  himself  up  to  that  point 
and  relying  upon  his  ingenuity  with  complete  confi- 
dence, Kenyon  mixed  himself  another  high-ball  and 
listened  with  a  certain  amount  of  eagerness  for  Belle's 
light  step. 

He  hadn't  long  to  wait.  He  had  just  gone  into  the 
dimly  lighted  hall  with  the  intention  of  getting  some 
air  on  the  front  doorstep,  when  the  door  opened  and 
Belle  let  herself  in. 

"  You  keep  nice  hours,"  he  said. 

Belle  ha4  been  dancing.  Her  cheeks  were  glowing 
and  her  eyes  bright,  She  had  never  looked  so  all- 


198        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

conqueringly  youthful  or  so  imbued  with  the  joy  of 
life.  She  came  across  to  him  like  a  young  goddess  of 
the  forest,  with  the  wild  beauty  and  that  suggestion  of 
unrestraint  which  always  made  Kenyon's  blood  run 
quickly. 

"Have  you  waited  for  me?"  she  asked.  "How 
perfectly  adorable  of'you." 

"  What  have  you  been  doing?  " 

"  Oh,  the  usual  things  —  dinner,  theatre,  danc- 
ing." 

Kenyon  went  nearer  and  put  his  hands  on  her  arms, 
hotly.  "  Curse  those  men !  "  he  said. 

"What  men?" 

"  The  men  who've  been  holding  you  to-night. 
Why  have  I  come  over?  Can't  you  scratch  these 
engagements  and  wait  for  me?  I'm  not  going  to 
share  you  with  every  Tom,  Dick  and  Harry  in  this 
place." 

A  feeling  of  triumph  came  to  Belle  —  a  new  feel- 
ing—  because  hitherto  this  man's  attitude  had  been 
that  of  master.  "  You're  jealous !  "  she  cried. 

Kenyon  turned  away  sharply.  For  once  he  was  not 
playing  with  this  girl  for  the  sport  of  the  thing,  just 
to  see  what  she  would  say  and  do  in  order  to  pass  away 
the  time.  The  whole  evening  had  tended  to  upset  his 
calculations  and  plans.  He  had  found  himself  thrown 
suddenly  into  a  position  of  responsibility, —  a  state 
that  he  avoided  with  rare  and  consummate  agility. 
And  now  came  Belle,  radiant  and  high-spirited,  from 
an  evening  spent  with  other  men, —  more  beautiful  and 
desirable  than  he  had  ever  seen  her  look. 


THE  CITY  199 

Belle  turned  him  back.  "You  are  jealous,  you 
are." 

"  Oh,  good  Lord,  no,"  said  Kenyon,  with  his  most 
bored  drawl.  "  Why  should  I  be?  After  all  it  isn't 
for  me  to  care  what  you  do,  is  it?  It's  a  large  world 
and  there's  plenty  of  room  for  both  of  us  — what?" 

He  walked  away. 

Triumph  blazed  in  Belle's  heart.  She  saw  in  Ken- 
yon's  eyes  that  he  was  saying  the  very  opposite  of  the 
thoughts  that  were  in  his  mind.  She  almost  shouted 
with  joy.  She  had  longed  to  see  into  the  heart  of  this 
man  who  was  under  such  complete  and  aggravating 
self-control, — -even  to  hurt  him  to  obtain  a  big,  spon- 
taneous outburst  of  emotion  from  him.  She  loved 
him  desperately,  indiscreetly  —  far  too  well  for  her 
peace  of  mind  —  and  she  urgently  needed  some 
answering  sparks  of  fire. 

She  didn't  move.  She  stood  with  her  cloak  thrown 
kack,  her  chin  held  high  and  the  light  falling  on  her 
dark  hair  and  white  flesh.  This  was  her  moment. 
She  would  seize  it. 

"  Yes,  there  is  plenty  of  room  for  us  both,"  she 
said,  "  and  the  fact  that  I  shall  go  on  dancing  with 
other  men  needn't  inconvenience  you  in  the  least.  I 
don't  suppose  that  we  shall  even  see  each  other  in  the 
crowd.  There  are  many  men  who'll  give  their  ears 
to  dance  with  me, —  I  mean  men  who  can  dande,  not 
bored  Englishmen." 

She  drew  blood.  Kenyon  went  across  to  her 
quickly.  "  How  dare  you  talk  to  me  like  that ! 
Curse  these  men  and  their  ears.  Who's  brought  me 


200        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

to  this  country  ?  You  know  I  came  for  you, —  you 
know  it.  I  am  jealous  —  as  jealous  as  the  devil. 
And  if  ever  you  let  another  man  put  his  arms  round 
you  I'll  smash  his  face."  He  put  out  his  hot  hands  to 
catch  her. 

But,  with  a  little  teasing  laugh,  Belle  dodged  and 
flitted  into  the  library.  The  spirit  of  coquettishness 
was  awake  in  her.  She  had  the  upper  hand  now  and 
a  small  account  to  render  for  missed  mails,  and  an 
appearance  of  being  too  sure.  She  threw  off  her  cloak 
and  stood  with  her  back  to  the  fireplace,  looking  like 
one  of  Romney's  pictures  of  Lady  Hamilton  come 
to  life. 

Kenyon  strode  in  after  her,  all  stirred  by  her  beauty. 
"  In  future,"  he  said,  "  you  dance  with  me.  You 
understand  ?  " 

Belle  raised  her  eyebrows  and  then  bowed  pro- 
foundly. "  As  you  say,  O  my  master !  "  And  then 
she  held  out  her  arms  with  a  sudden  delicious  abandon. 
"  Take  me,  then.  Let's  dance  all  the  way  through 
life." 

Kenyon  caught  her,  and  all  about  the  room  these 
two  went,  moving  together  in  perfect  unison,  cheek 
to  cheek,  until  almost  breathless  Belle  broke  into  a 
little  laugh,  stopped  singing,  and  said :  "  The  band's 
tired."  But  Kenyon  held  her  tighter  and  closer  and 
kissed  her  lips  again  and  again  and  again. 

With  a  little  touch  of  warning  in  its  tone  the  clock 
on  the  mantel-piece  presently  struck  two,  and  Belle 
freed  herself  and  straightened  her  hair  with  a  rather 
uncertain  hand.  "  I  must  go  now,"  she  said  breath- 


THE  CITY  201 

lessly.  "  Father  may  be  working  late.  Supposing  he 
came  through  this  room  ?  " 

"  Serve  him  right,"  said  Kenyon. 

They  went  upstairs  together  on  tip-toe,  and  halted 
for  a  moment  on  the  threshold  of  Belle's  bed-room. 
Through  the  half-open  door  Kenyon  saw  the  glow  of 
yellow  light  on  the  dressing-table,  and  the  corner  of 
a  virginal  bed.  Once  more  he  kissed  her  and  then, 
breathing  hard,  went  to  his  own  room,  stood  in  the 
darkness  for  a  moment,  and  thanked  his  lucky  star 
for  the  gift  of  Belle. 

XIII 

THE  following  afternoon,  Peter,  Kenyon  and  Belle 
went  to  see  Ranken  Townsend's  pictures  and  to  have 
tea  with  Betty.  The  little  party  was  a  great  success. 
Peter  and  the  artist  got  on  splendidly  together,  which 
filled  Betty  with  joy  and  gladness,  and  Kenyon  had 
added  to  the  general  smoothness  and  pleasantness  by 
offering  extremely  intelligent  and  enthusiastic  criticism 
of  the  canvasses  that  were  shown  to  him,  drawing 
subtle  comparisons  between  them  and  those  of  Rey- 
nolds and  Gainsborough.  Like  all  true  artists,  Town- 
send  was  a  humble  man  and  unsuspicious.  He  be- 
lieved, in  the  manner  of  all  good  workers,  that  he  had 
yet  to  find  himself,  although  he  had  met  with  uncom- 
mon success.  He  was,  therefore,  much  heartened  and 
warmed  by  the  remarks  of  one  who,  although  young, 
evidently  knew  of  what  he  was  talking  and  proved 
himself  to  be  something  of  a  judge.  When  Kenyon 


202        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

received  a  cordial  invitation  to  come  again  to  the 
studio  he  solidified  the  good  impression  that  he  had 
made  by  saying  that  he  would  be  honoured  and  de- 
lighted. 

There  had  been  a  sharp  shower  during  tea,  but  the 
sky  had  cleared  when  they  left  Gramercy  Park,  taking 
Betty  with  them,  and  so  they  started  out  to  walk 
home. 

Belle  and  Betty  went  on  in  front,  arm  in  arm,  and 
the  two  friends  followed.  This  suited  Kenyon  ex- 
actly. He  had  laid  his  plan  and  had  something  to  say 
to  Peter. 

Belle  was  very  happy,  and  she  showed  it.  She 
looked  round  at  Betty  with  her  eyes  dancing.  "  I  can 
see  that  you're  dying  to  ask  me  something,"  she  said. 
"  But  don't.  You  and  I  don't  have  to  ask  each  other 
questions.  We've  always  told  each  other  everything, 
and  we  always  will." 

"  Belle,  you're  en-ga " 

"  S-s-s-h !     Don't  mention  the  word." 

"Why?" 

"  Well,  we've  been  talking  this  afternoon  and  Nich- 
olas says,  and  I  think  he's  right  —  though  I  wish  he 
weren't  —  that  he  doesn't  want  to  go  to  father  until 
he's  been  here  longer  and  has  made  up  his  mind  what 
he's  going  to  do.  You  see,  he's  not  well  off.  He's 
got  to  work, —  although  I  can't  fancy  Nicholas  work- 
ing,—  and  so  we're  not  going  to  be  really  engaged 
for  a  few  months.  Meantime,  he's  going  to  look 
round  and  find  something  to  do.  That'll  be  easy. 
You  don't  know  how  clever  he  is, —  not  merely  clever 


THE  CITY  203 

—  a  monkey  can  be  clever,  or  a  conjurer  —  the  word 
I  meant  to  use  was  '  able.'     Aren't  you  glad  ?     Isn't 
it  splendid  ?  " 

"  Oh,  my  dear,"  said  Betty,  "  wouldn't  it  be  per- 
fectly wonderful  if  we  could  be  married  on  the  same 
day?  Of  course  I've  seen  it  coming " 

Belle  laughed.  "  I  knew  you'd  say  that.  Person- 
ally I  didn't  see  it  coming.  After  we'd  left  Oxford 
I  began  to  think  that  Nicholas  had  only  been  flirting 
with  me.  He  wrote  such  curious,  aloof  little  letters 
and  very  few  of  them.  They  might  have  been  written 
by  an  epigramist  to  his  maiden  aunt;  but  last  night, 

—  well,  last  night  made  everything  different,  and  this 
afternoon  we've  had  a  long  talk.     Of  course  I  wish 
we  were  going  to  be  openly  and  properly  engaged,  but 
I'm  very  happy  and  so  I  don't  grumble." 

"  As  the  future  Countess  of  Shropshire,  I  wonder 
whether  you  will  ever  give  a  little  back  room  in  your 
beautiful  English  place  to  the  young  American  lawyer 
and  his  wife !  " 

"  Betty,  I  swear  to  you  that  I  don't  care  a  dime 
about  all  that  now, —  I  mean  the  title  and  the  place. 
It's  just  Nicholas  that  I  want  —  Nicholas,  and  no  one 
else.  I  wouldn't  care  if  he  were  what  he  calls  a 
'  bounder '  or  a  '  townee/  My  dear,  I'm  mad  about 
him  —  just  mad." 

"Isn't  everything  as  right  as  Truth?"  said  Betty. 
"  The  more  I  see  Peter  the  more  I  love  him.  He's,— 
well,  he's  a  man,  and  he's  mine.  He's  mine  for  an- 
other reason,  and  that's  because  he's  always  going  to 
be  a  boy,  and  I'm  here  to  look  after  him.  He'll  need 


204 

me.  And  I  must  have  him  need  me,  too,  because  I 
need  to  be  needed.  Do  you  understand  ?  " 

Belle  nodded.  "  You're  the  born  mother,  my  dear," 
she  said,  "  whereas,  I'm, —  well,  not.  I  want  love  — 
just  love.  I'll  give  everything  I've  got  in  the  world 
for  that  —  everything.  Love  and  excitement  and 
movement, —  to  go  from  place  to  place  meeting  new 
people,  hearing  new  languages,  seeing  new  types,  liv- 
ing bigly  and  broadly,  being  consulted  by  a  man  who's 
brilliant  and  far-seeing, —  that's  what  I  need.  That's 
my  idea  of  life.  Ah-h! "  She  shot  out  a  deep  breath 
and  threw  her  chin  up  as  though  to  challenge  argu- 
ment. 

Betty  watched  her  with  admiration.  She  had  never 
looked  so  unusual,  so  exhilarated,  so  fine.  All  about 
her  there  was  the  very  essence  of  youth  and  courage 
and  health.  There  was  a  glow  in  her  white  skin  that 
was  the  mere  reflection  of  the  fire  that  was  alight  in 
her  heart.  Given  happiness  this  girl  would  burst  into 
the  most  fragrant  blossoming  and  gleam  among  her 
sisters  like  a  rose  in  a  pansy  bed.  Given  pain  and  dis- 
illusion she  had  it  in  her  to  fling  rules,  observances, 
caution,  common  sense  and  even  self-respect  to  the 
four  winds  and  go  with  all  possible  speed  to  the 
devil. 

"  What  would  have  happened  to  us  both  if  we 
hadn't  gone  to  Oxford?  "  asked  Betty,  with  an  almost 
comical  touch  of  gravity.  "  Think !  I  should  be 
doomed  to  be  a  little  old  maid,  with  nothing  but  an 
even  smaller  dog  to  keep  in  order,  and  as  for 
you " 


THE  CITY  205 

"  I  ?  Don't  let's  talk  about  it.  I  should  have  gone 
top-pace  through  several  years  and  then,  with  thirty 
looming  ahead,  married  a  nice  safe  man  with  oodles 
of  money  who  would  spend  his  life  following  me 
round.  Thank  Heaven,  I  shall  never  be  the  centre 
of  that  ghastly  picture !  " 

And  so  they  went  on,  these  two  young  things,  open- 
ing up  their  hearts  to  each  other  as  they  walked  home 
and  flying  off  at  all  manner  of  feminine  tangents. 

Kenyon,  perfectly  satisfied  with  his  talk  to  Belle, 
whom  he  had  secured  without  binding  himself  to  any- 
thing definite,  was  wearing  white  spats,  and  so  he 
picked  his  way  across  the  wet  streets  like  a  cat  on 
hot  bricks.  For  several  blocks  he  permitted  Peter  to 
talk  about  Betty.  His  affectation  of  interest  and  sym- 
pathy was  not  so  well  done  as  usual.  He  had  deter- 
mined, with  a  sort  of  professional  jealousy,  not  to 
allow  Ita  Strabosck  to  trade  on  Graham's  credulity 
any  longer.  All  his  thoughts  were  concentrated  on 
his  plan  to  smash  up  that  burlesque  arrangement,  as  he 
inwardly  called  it.  If  anyone  were  to  make  use 
of  Graham  he  intended  to  be  that  one.  The  girl,  at 
present  a  humble  member  of  the  great  army  of  para- 
sites in  which  he  held  a  commission,  must  be  cleared 
out.  She  was  inconveniently  in  the  way. 

When  Peter  was  obliged  to  stop  for  breath,  Ken- 
yon  jumped  in.  "  Look  here !  "  he  said.  "  You're 
coming  with  me  to  the  shrine  of  the  pernicious  Pa- 
powsky  to-night." 

"  You  mean  on  Graham's  business  ?  "  asked  Peter. 
"  Is  it  absolutely  necessary  to  go  to  that  place  ?  " 


206        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Absolutely.  You'll  see  why,  if  everything  works 
as  I  think  it  will,  when  we  get  there." 

"Right.     And  how  about  Graham?" 

"  You  and  Graham  are  going  to  have  dinner  with 
me  at  Sherry's.  I  shall  have  to  see  that  he  has  half 
a  bottle  too  much  champagne.  That'll  make  him  care- 
less and  put  a  bit  of  devil  into  him,  and  when  I  sug- 
gest that  he  shall  take  us  to  Papowsky's,  he  will  jump 
at  the  notion.  He's  awful  keen  to  show  us  what  a 
blood  he  is.  Once  he  gets  us  inside  the  rest  will 
follow." 

"  I  see.  By  Jove,  I  shall  be  thundering  glad  when 
Graham's  plucked  out  of  this  wretched  mess.  The 
only  thing  is  I'm  booked  to  dine  with  Mr.  Townsend 
at  his  club  to-night." 

"  It  can't  be  done,"  said  Kenyon.  "  Directly  you  get 
home  you  must  telephone.  Say  that  an  urgent  mat- 
ter has  just  cropped  up  and  beg  to  be  excused.  Call 
it  business  —  call  it  anything  you  like  —  but  get  out 
of  it." 

"All  right!"  said  Peter.  "I'm  heart  and  soul 
with  you,  old  boy.  I'm  very  grateful  for  all  the 
trouble  you're  taking.  You  always  were  a  good 
chap." 

"  My  dear  Peter,  add  to  my  possession  of  the  ordi- 
nary number  of  senses  one  that  is  almost  as  rare  as 
the  Dodo, —  the  sense  of  gratitude.  Hello!  Here's 
some  of  the  family  in  the  car!" 

They  had  halted  on  the  steps  of  the  Doctor's  house 
as  Mrs.  Guthrie  and  Ethel  were  driven  up.  Kenyon 
sprang  forward,  opened  the  door  and  handed  the 


THE  CITY  207 

ladies  out  with  an  air  that  Raleigh  himself  would  have 
found  commendable. 

"  Blood  tells,"  said  Belle,  who  watched  from  the  top 
step,  with  a  proud  smile. 

"  Yes,"  said  Betty,  "  but  I  prefer  muscle.    Look!  " 

The  pavement  was  uneven  in  front  of  the  house 
and  the  rain  had  made  a  little  pool.  So  Peter  picked 
his  mother  up,  as  though  she  were  as  light  as  a  bunch 
of  feathers,  and  carried  her  into  the  house. 

"  My  dearest  big  boy !  "  she  said. 

"  Darling  little  Mum !  "  said  Peter. 

XIV 

KENYON,  turned  out  as  excellently  as  usual,  led  the 
way  into  the  dining-room  at  Sherry's.  It  was  a  quar- 
ter to  eight.  Every  other  table  was  occupied.  The 
large  room  was  too  warm  and  was  filled  with  the  con- 
glomerate aromas  of  food.  Peter  sat  on  the  right  of 
his  host  and  Graham  on  the  left.  Both  men  were 
quiet  and  distrait, —  Peter  because  he  was  anxious, 
Graham  for  the  reason  that  he  had  not  been  able  to 
leave  behind  him  the  carking  worries  that  now  fell 
daily  to  his  lot.  Kenyon,  on  the  contrary,  was  in  his 
best  form,  and  even  a  little  excited.  Apart  from  the 
fact  that  he  rather  liked  having  something  to  do  that 
would  prove  his  knowledge  of  life  and  the  accuracy 
of  his  powers  of  psychology,  he  was  looking  forward 
to  be  amused  with  what  went  on  in  the  studio-apart- 
ment of  the  Papowsky. 

"By  Jove!"  he  said,  looking  around  and  arrang- 


208        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ing  his  tie  over  the  points  of  his  collar  with  expert 
fingers, —  a  thing  which  Graham  immediately  pro- 
ceeded to  do  also, — "  this  place  has  a  quite  distinct 
atmosphere.  Don't  you  think  so,  Peter?" 

"Has  it?" 

"  One  would,  I  see,  choose  it  for  a  trying  and  dull- 
bright  dinner  with  a  prospective  mother-in-law  or  with 
some  dear  thing,  safely  married,  with  whom  one  had 
once  rashly  imagined  one's  self  to  be  in  love.  Waiter, 
the  wine  list !  " 

Graham  laughed. 

Kenyon,  scoring  his  first  point,  continued  airily. 
"  For  my  part,  I  shall  make  a  point  of  dining  here  one 
night  with  an  alluring  young  thing  fresh  from  the 
romantic  quietude  of  a  Convent  School.  I  feel  that 
these  discreet  lights  and  reserved  colours  will  give  a 
certain  amount  of  weight  and  even  solemnity  to  my 
careful  flattery  —  A  large  bottle  of  Perrier  Jouet 
'02,  and  be  sparing  with  the  ice.  Peter,  I  think  you'll 
find  that  this  caviare  gives  many  points  to  the  tired 
stuff  that  used  to  be  palmed  off  on  us  at  Buol's  and 
other  undergraduate  places  of  puerile  riotousness." 

The  dinner,  which  Kenyon  had  ordered  with  becom- 
ing care,  would  have  satisfied  the  epicureanism  of  a 
Russian  aristocrat.  During  all  its  courses  the  host 
kept  up  a  running  fire  of  anecdote  which  quickly  made 
the  table  a  merry  one.  He  also  saw  to  it  that  Graham's 
glass  was  never  empty.  They  sat  laughing,  smoking 
and  drinking  Creme  Yvette  until  they  were  the  last 
people  in  the  room  except  for  an  old  bloated  man  and 
a  very  young  Hebrew  girl.  The  band,  which  had 


THE  CITY  209 

mixed  ragtime  indiscriminately  with  Italian  opera  and 
Austrian  waltzes,  and  played  them  all  equally  well, 
went  off  to  acquire  the  second  wind  and  the  relaxed 
muscles  necessary  for  a  later  performance,  and  the 
waiters  had  long  since  rearranged  the  table  for  supper 
before  Kenyon  suggested  adjourning  to  a  club  for 
a  game  of  billiards  which  would  amuse  them  until  it 
was  time  to  begin  the  business  of  the  evening.  So 
they  walked  round  to  the  Harvard  Club,  and  here 
Peter  —  the  only  one  of  the  party  who  was  completely 
his  own  master  —  became  host. 

They  played  until  a  little  short  of  twelve  o'clock. 
By  this  time,  having  been  additionally  primed  up  with 
one  or  two  Scotch  whiskeys,  Graham  was  ready  for 
anything,  and  it  was  then  that  Kenyon  suggested  that 
he  should  take  them  to  the  famous  studio.  Graham 
jumped  at  the  idea,  falling,  as  Kenyon  knew  that  he 
would,  into  the  little  trap  set  for  him.  "  We're  chil- 
dren in  your  hands,  Graham,"  he  said,  with  a  subtle 
touch  of  flattery.  "  Lead  us  into  the  vortex  of  art 
with  the  lid  off.  I'm  most  frightfully  keen  to  see  this 
place  and  it'll  be  great  fun  for  you,  duly  protected,  to 
find  out  whether  the  Papowsky  has  discovered  whether 
you  were  the  Knight  Errant  who  rescued  one  of  her 
victims.  Romance,  old  boy  —  romance  with  a  big  R." 
And  so  Graham,  more  than  a  little  unsteady  and  with 
uproarious  laughter,  led  the  way. 

When  they  arrived  at  the  studio-apartment  in  For- 
tieth Street  they  found  the  hall  filled  with  people. 
It  happened  that  Papowsky  was  giving  an  Egyptian 
night  and  nearly  all  of  the  habitues  were  in  appro- 


210        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

priate  costumes.  With  the  cunning  of  her  species  this 
woman  knew  very  well  that  few  things  appeal  so 
strongly  to  a  certain  type  of  men  and  women  as  dress- 
ing up, —  which  generally  means  undressing.  The 
Japanese  servant  who  took  their  hats  and  coats  wel- 
comed Graham  with  oily  and  deferential  cordiality. 
"  We  are  having  a  big  night,  sir,"  he  said,  with  the 
peculiar  sibilation  of  his  kind  and  with  his  broad,  flat 
hands  clasped  together.  "  It  is  Madame's  birthday, 
sir.  Yes,  sir.  You  and  the  gentlemen  will  enjoy  it 
very  much." 

Peter  and  Kenyon  followed  Graham  into  the  studio. 
Their  curiosity,  already  stirred  by  the  sight  of  the  men 
and  women  in  the  hall,  was  added  to  by  the  Rembrandt 
effect  of  the  high,  wide  room,  whose  darkness  was 
only  touched  here  and  there  by  curious  faint  lights. 
The  buzz  of  voices  everywhere  and  little  bursts  of 
laughter  proved  that  there  were  many  people  present. 
As  they  went  in,  a  powerful  lime-light  was  suddenly 
focused  on  the  centre  of  the  room  and  into  this  slid 
a  string  of  young,  small-breasted,  round-limbed  girls. 
Led  by  one  who  contorted  herself  in  what  was  sup- 
posedly the  Egyptian  manner,  they  moved  to  and  fro 
with  bent  knees  and  angular  gestures,  and  rigid  pro- 
files. Music  came  out  of  the  darkness, —  the  music 
of  a  string  band  with  cymbals. 

"  Good  Lord !  "  said  Kenyon.  "  What  an  amazing 
mixture  of  exotic  stinks !  " 

"  Look  out  for  your  money,"  said  Peter,  with  a 
touch  of  blunt  materialism. 

Graham  made  for  an  unoccupied  alcove,  in  which 


THE  CITY  211 

there  was  a  flabby  divan.  On  this  they  all  three  sat 
down  and  began  to  peer  about.  A  few  yards  away 
from  them  they  presently  made  out  an  astonishing 
group  of  young  men  dressed  as  Egyptians.  They 
were  sitting  in  affectionate  closeness,  simpering  and 
tittering  together.  On  the  other  side  they  gradually 
discerned  an  overwhelmingly  fat,  elderly  woman  hold- 
ing a  kind  of  Court.  She  was  almost  enveloped  in 
pearls.  Otherwise  she  was  scantily  hidden.  Her  feet 
were  in  sandals.  Several  mere  boys  had  arranged 
themselves  in  picturesque  attitudes  about  her  and  half 
a  dozen  maidens  were  grouped  round  her  chair.  One 
was  fanning  her  with  a  large  yellow  leaf.  The  blue 
light  under  which  Graham  had  sat  listening  to  the 
whispered  appeal  of  Ita  Strabosck  fell  softly  and 
erotically  upon  them. 

"  Circe  come  to  life,"  said  Kenyon. 

"  Ugh !  I  don't  quite  know  how  I'm  going  to  pre- 
vent myself  from  being  sick,"  said  Peter. 

"  Ah !  but  wait  a  bit,"  said  Graham.  "  The  show 
hasn't  begun  yet." 

It  made  a  fairly  good  beginning  as  he  spoke.  The 
girls  in  the  circle  of  light  brought  their  attitudinizing 
to  an  end  and  their  places  were  instantly  taken  by  two 
painted  men  in  coloured  loin-cloths.  To  a  screaming 
outburst  of  wild  and  incoherent  music  they  gave  what 
seemed  to  Kenyon  to  be  a  perfect  imitation  of  civet- 
cats  at  play.  They  crawled  along  on  all-fours,  sprang 
high  into  the  air,  crouched,  bounded,  whirled  round 
each  other  and  finally,  amid  a  roar  of  applause,  rolled 
out  of  view  wrapped  in  each  other's  arms. 


212        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Um ! "  said  Kenyon.  "  After  just  such  an  ex- 
hibition as  that  Rome  burst  into  flames." 

There  was  insistent  demand  for  an  encore.  The 
performance  was  repeated  with  the  same  gusto  and 
relish.  The  three  men  saw  nothing  of  it.  Just  as  the 
band  burst  forth  again,  Kenyon  made  a  long  arm, 
caught  the  skimpy  covering  of  a  girl  who  was  passing 
and  drew  her  into  the  alcove. 

"  Come  and  cheer  us  up,  Minutia,"  he  said.  "  We 
feel  like  lost  souls  here." 

The  girl  was  willing  enough.  It  was  her  business 
to  cheer.  She  stood  in  front  of  them  for  a  moment 
so  that  the  blue  light  should  show  her  charms.  She 
looked  very  young  and  tiny.  Fair  hair  was  twisted 
round  her  head.  She  wore  nothing  but  a  thin,  loose 
Egyptian  smock,  but  her  small  snub  nose  and  impu- 
dent mouth  placed  her,  whatever  might  be  her  cos- 
tume, on  Broadway.  "  Say !  Why  are  you  muts 
dressed  like  men  ?  "  she  asked  with  eager  interest. 

"  Oh,  well,"  said  Kenyon,  "  we  happen  to  be  men ; 
but  I  swear  that  we  won't  advertise  the  fact." 

The  girl  greatly  enjoyed  the  remark,  but  her  scream 
of  laughter  was  drowned  by  the  band.  Then  she 
caught  sight  of  Graham.  "Oh,  hello,  Kid!  So 
you've  come  back." 

Graham  made  room  for  her.  He  rather  liked  being 
recognized.  Kenyon  would  see  that  he  knew  his  way 
about.  "  Yes,  here  I  am  again.  It's  difficult  to  get 
the  Papowsky  dope  out  of  the  system." 

"  Don't  see  why  you  should  try.  It's  pretty  good 
dope,  I  guess."  She  snuggled  herself  in  between 


THE  CITY  213 

Graham  and  Kenyon,  putting  an  arm  round  each. 
She  bent  across  Kenyon  to  examine  Peter  and  gave  an 
exaggeratedly  dramatic  cry  of  surprise  and  admira- 
tion. "  My  God !  It's  a  giant !  Say,  dearie,  you'd 
be  the  King  of  all  the  pussies,  in  a  skin.  All  them 
dinky  little  love-birds  would  hop  round  your  feet  and 
chirp.  Oh,  gosh,  you'd  make  some  hit  among  the 
artists,  sure !  " 

"Think  so?"  said  Peter.  He  would  have  given 
a  great  deal  for  a  pipe  at  that  moment,  so  that  he 
could  puff  out  great  clouds  of  smoke  as  a  disinfect- 
ant. 

"  A  gala  night,"  said  Graham. 

"  Sure.  If  the  police  were  to  make  a  raid  to-night, 
—  gee,  there'd  be  a  fine  list  of  names  in  to-morrer's 
papers !  " 

"Think  they  will?"  asked  Kenyon.  "By  Jove! 
I  wish  they  would.  Think  of  seeing  these  people 
scuffling  like  frightened  rabbits.  It  would  be  epoch- 
making." 

The  girl  turned  a  keenly  interested  eye  on  Kenyon 
and  looked  him  over  with  unabashable  deliberation. 
"  You've  got  a  funny  kind  of  accent,"  she  said. 
"What  is  it?  English?" 

It  was  the  first  time  that  Kenyon  had  ever  been 
accused  of  speaking  with  an  accent.  He  was  de- 
lighted. It  appealed  to  his  alert  sense  of  humour. 
He  laughed  and  nodded. 

"  The  giant  ain't  English,  is  he  ?  Are  you, 
dearie?" 

"  No,"  said  Peter. 


214        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  That's  fine.  I  guess  I  don't  like  the  English 
much.  They  always  strike  me  as  being  like  Amer- 
icans, trying  hard  to  be  different." 

"  You  don't  dislike  me,  I  hope  ?  That  would  be  a 
very  bitter  blow,"  said  Kenyon,  tweeking  her  ear. 

"  Oh,  you're  a  comic,"  she  said.  "  You're  all  right. 
Is  this  your  first  visit  ?  " 

"Yes.  Have  you  been  here  long?"  Kenyon 
asked  the  question  carelessly,  as  though  to  keep  the 
ball  moving.  It  was,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  begin- 
ning of  his  plan  to  disillusion  Graham. 

"  Oh,  I've  been  in  the  business  ever  since  it  started. 
Ask  the  kid,  he  knows.  Don't  you,  kid  ?  " 

"  Rather,"  said  Graham. 

"  I  used  to  be  in  the  chorus,  but  this  is  ther  life." 

"  I  suppose  so,"  said  Kenyon.  "  Variety,  gaiety, 
art, —  what  more  can  any  girl  desire  ?  " 

"  Dollars,"  she  said  dryly.  "  And  I  make  more 
here,  by  a  long  way." 

"  That's  good.  But, —  but  don't  you  get  a  little  fed 
up?  I  mean  it  must  be  hopelessly  monotonous  to  be 
shut  up  in  one  place  all  the  time." 

"  Don't  know  whatcher  mean.  Translate  that, 
won't  you  ?  " 

"  He  means  never  getting  out,"  said  Graham. 

"  Never  getting  out !  I  don't  get  you,  Steve.  Me 
and  my  sister  get  away  after  the  show,  same  as  any 
other." 

"  What ! "  Graham  was  incredulous.  It  struck 
him  that  the  girl  was  lying  for  reasons  of  loyalty  to 
her  employer.  He  knew  better. 


THE  CITY  215 

"  Oh,  I  see !  "  said  Kenyon,  leading  her  on  care- 
fully. "  You  don't  live  here,  then  ?  " 

"  Live  here?  Of  course  I  don't.  I  come  about  ten 
o'clock  every  night  and  leave  anywhere  between  three 
and  four  in  the  morning.  Earlier  if  there's  nothing 
doing." 

"  Oh,  I  thought  that  the  girls  here  are, —  well, 
held  up,  kept  here  all  the  time, —  prisoners,  so  to 
speak." 

A  shrill  amused  laugh  rang  out.  "  Oh,  cut  it  out ! ' 
What's  all  this  dope?  Say!  you've  been  reading 
White  Slave  books.  You're  bug-house  —  dippy. 
Why,  this  is  a  respectable  place,  this  is.  This  is  the 
house  of  Art.  We're  models,  that's  what  we  are. 
We're  only  here  for  local  colour.  If  we  choose  to 
make  a  bit  extra  on  our  own,  we  can."  She  laughed 
again.  It  was  a  good  joke.  The  best  that  she  had 
heard  for  years. 

Kenyon  threw  a  quick  glance  at  Graham's  face. 
He  could  just  see  it  in  the  dim  light.  The  boy  was 
listening  intently  —  incredulously.  So  also  was 
Peter,  who  had  drawn  himself  into  a  corner  and  was 
hunched  up  uncomfortably. 

Kenyon  began  to  feel  excited.  Everything  was 
going  almost  unbelievably  well.  The  girl  was  so 
frank,  so  open  and  obviously  spontaneous.  It  was 
excellent.  "  Of  course  you  tell  us  these  things,"  he 
said,  voicing  what  he  knew  was  going  silently  through 
Graham's  mind.  "  But  we  know  better.  We  know 
that  you,  like  that  poor  little  girl,  Ita  Strabosck,  are 
watched  and  not  allowed  to  get  away  under  any  cir- 


216        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

cumstances.  Now,  why  not  tell  us  the  truth?  We 
may  be  able  to  help  you  escape,  too." 

Again  she  laughed.  "  Oh,  say !  "  she  said.  "  What 
are  you  anyway?  Reporters  on  the  trail  of  a  story? 
I'm  telling  you  the  truth.  Why  not?  As  for  Ita, — 
Oh,  ho!  She  put  it  all  over  a  boob,  she  did.  She's 
ambitious,  she  is.  She  was  out  to  find  a  mut  who'd 
keep  her,  that  was  her  game.  She  told  us  so  from 
the  first.  We  used  to  watch  her  trying  one  after  an- 
other of  the  soft  ones.  But  they  were  wise,  they 
were.  But  at  last  some  little  feller  fell  for  her  foreign 
accent  and  little  sobs.  She  had  a  fine  tale  all  ready. 
Oh,  she's  clever.  She  ought  to  be  on  the  stage  play- 
ing parts.  Most  of  us  go  round  to  her  place  in  the 
daytime  and  have  a  good  time  with  some  of  her  men 
friends.  I've  not  been  yet.  But  from  what  my  sis- 
ter says,  I  wouldn't  be  a  bit  surprised  if  she  gets  her 
man  to  marry  her.  From  what  she  says,  he's  a  senti- 
mental Alick,  and,  O  Gosh!  won't  she  lead  him  some 
dance !  " 

At  last  Graham  broke  forth,  his  face  white,  his  eyes 
blazing  and  his  whole  body  shaking  as  though  he  had 
ague.  "  You're  lying !  "  he  shouted.  "  Every  word 
you've  said's  a  lie !  " 

The  girl,  entirely  unoffended  at  this  involuntary  out- 
burst, bent  forward  and  looked  at  Graham  with  a  new 
gleam  of  intelligence,  amusement  and  curiosity. 
"  My  word,  I  believe  you're  Mr.  Strabosck.  I  believe 
you're  the  boob.  Oh,  say!  come  into  the  light.  I 
guess  I  must  have  a  look  at  you." 

Graham  got  up,  stood  swaying  for  a  moment  as 


THE  CITY  217 

though  he  had  received  a  blow  between  the  eyes,  and 
staggered  across  the  room  and  out  into  the  passage. 

"  Now  he  knows,"  said  Kenyon.  "  Come  on, 
Peter.  We  shall  have  our  work  cut  to  hold  him  in. 
There  was  blood  in  his  eyes."  Utterly  ignoring  the 
girl,  Kenyon  made  for  the  door,  forced  his  way 
through  new  arrivals  and  found  Graham  utterly  sober, 
but  with  his  mouth  set  dangerously,  standing  in  front 
of  the  Japanese.  "  My  hat  and  coat,  quick!  "  he  was 
saying,  "  or  I'll  break  the  place  up." 

"  Steady,  steady,"  said  Kenyon.  "  We  don't  want 
a  scene  here." 

"  Scene  be  damned.  I  tell  you  something's  got  to 
break." 

The  Japanese  ducked  into  the  coat-room. 

"  Where's  Peter?  "  Graham  looked  back  expecting 
to  see  his  brother's  head  and  shoulders  above  the 
crowd.  There  was  no  sign  of  him. 

By  accident  the  lime-light  which  had  been  suddenly 
turned  on  for  a  new  performance  fell  on  Peter  as  he 
was  marching  towards  the  door  of  the  studio.  In- 
stantly he  found  himself  surrounded  by  half  a  dozen 
good-natured  men  who  had  all  taken  a  little  too  much 
to  drink.  They,  like  the  other  people  present,  were  in 
Egyptian  clothes  and  obviously  glad  to  see  in  Peter 
a  healthy  normal  specimen  of  humanity. 

"  Oh,  hello,  brother,  where  are  you  off  to?  "  asked 
one. 

"  Out !  "  said  Peter  shortly. 

"  I'll  be  darned  if  you  are.  Come  and  have  a 
drink!" 


218        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  No,  thanks,  I've  other  things  to  do." 

"  Oh,  rot !  Be  a  sport  and  stay  and  help  us  to  stir 
things  up.  Come  on,  now !  " 

Peter  tried  to  push  his  way  through.  "  Please  get 
out  of  the  way,"  he  said. 

But  a  jovial  red-headed  fellow  got  into  it. 
"  You're  staying,  if  I  have  to  make  you." 

Something  snapped  in  Peter's  brain.  Before  he 
could  control  himself  he  bent  down  and  picked  up  the 
man  by  the  scruff  of  his  neck  and  the  cloth  that  was 
wound  round  his  middle  and  heaved  him  over  the  heads 
of  the  crowd  into  a  divan,  and  then  hitting  out  right 
and  left  cleared  a  path  to  the  door,  leaving  chaos  and 
bleeding  noses  behind  him.  Without  waiting  to  get 
his  hat  and  coat  he  made  a  dash  for  the  elevator, 
caught  it  just  as  it  was  about  to  descend  and  went 
down  to  the  main  floor  dishevelled  and  panting. 

Out  in  the  street  he  saw  Kenyon  trying  to  put 
Graham  into  a  taxicab.  Kenyon  saw  him  and  called 
out.  "  Come  on,  or  Papowsky  will  make  it  hot  for 
us." 

On  his  way  home  from  a  late  evening  at  one  of  his 
clubs,  Ranken  Townsend  caught  the  name  Papowsky, 
whose  evil  reputation  had  come  to  his  ears.  He 
threw  a  quick  glance  at  the  men  who  were  leaving  her 
place  and  saw  that  one  of  them  was  Peter.  He  drew 
up  and  stood  in  front  of  the  man  in  whom  he  thought 
he  had  recognized  cleanness  and  excellence  and  told 
himself  that  he  was  utterly  mistaken. 

"  So  this  was  your  precious  business  engagement," 
he  said,  with  icy  contempt.  "  Well,  I  don't  give  my 


THE  CITY  219 

daughter  to  a  man  who  shares  her  with  women  like 
Papowsky,  so  you  may  consider  yourself  free.  Good 
night." 

And  the  smile  that  turned  up  the  corners  of  Ken- 
yon's  mouth  had  in  it  the  epitome  of  triumph.  All 
along  the  line  he  had  won.  All  along  the  line. 

Peter  watched  the  tall  disappearing  figure.  He  felt 
as  though  he  had  been  kicked  in  the  mouth. 


PART  THREE 

LIFE 


THAT  night  was  one  of  the  most  extraordinary  that 
Peter  ever  spent.  Although  he  was  smarting  under 
the  terrible  injustice  of  Ranken  Townsend's  few,  but 
very  definite  words,  and  felt  like  a  man  who  had  sud- 
denly come  up  to  an  abyss,  he  took  Graham  in  hand 
and  devoted  himself,  with  all  the  tenderness  of  a 
woman,  to  this  poor  boy. 

All  the  way  home  in  the  cab  Graham  had  been  more 
or  less  held  down  by  Kenyon  and  his  brother.  His 
brain  was  in  a  wild  chaos.  The  realization  that  he 
had  been  tricked  and  made  a  fool  of  hit  him  hard.  In 
his  first  great  flush  of  anger  he  was  filled  with  an  over- 
whelming desire  to  go  to  the  apartment  in  which  he 
had  placed  Ita  Strabosck  and  smash  it  up.  He  wanted 
to  have  the  satisfaction  of  breaking  and  ripping  apart 
every  piece  of  furniture  that  he  had  bought  to  make 
her  comfortable  and  happy,  and  make  an  absolute 
shambles  of  the  place.  He  wanted  also  to  order  that 
girl  out  into  the  street.  At  that  moment  he  no  longer 
cared  what  happened  to  her  or  where  she  went.  His 
vanity  had  received  its  first  rude  shock.  All  the  way 
home  he  shouted  at  the  top  of  his  voice  and  struggled 
to  get  away  from  the  men  who  were  looking  after 
him.  It  took  all  Peter's  strength  to  hold  him  tight. 
It  was  by  no  means  a  good  sight  to  see  this  young 


224        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

man,  who  only  half  an  hour  before  had  been  exhila- 
rated by  champagne  and  the  feeling  that  he  was  really 
of  some  account  as  a  man  of  the  world,  reduced  to  a 
condition  of  utter  weariness  by  his  violent  outbursts. 
At  first  he  absolutely  refused  to  enter  the  house  and 
insisted  upon  walking  up  and  down  the  street.  Fi- 
nally, by  making  an  appeal  to  his  brother's  affection, 
Peter  persuaded  him  to  go  in  quietly  and  up  to  his 
own  room.  There,  pale  and  exhausted  and  entirely 
out  of  spirits,  Graham,  turned  quickly  on  his  brother. 
"  Keep  Kenyon  out,"  he  said.  "  For  God's  sake,  keep 
Kenyon  out !  I  want  you." 

Kenyon  heard  these  words  and  smiled  to  himself, 
nodded  to  Peter,  and  went  downstairs  again  to  make 
himself  comfortable  in  the  library  and  have  a  final 
cigarette  before  going  to  bed.  He  had  every  reason 
for  self-congratulation.  Graham  was  free, —  there 
was  no  doubt  about  that, —  and  it  looked  as  though 
Peter  also  would  now  be  able  to  be  made  useful  again. 
Luck  certainly  had  been  on  his  side  that  night. 

It  was  not  much  after  one  o'clock  when  Peter  shut 
the  door  of  Graham's  bed-room.  From  then  on- 
wards he  turned  himself  into  a  sort  of  nurse,  doing 
his  best  to  concentrate  all  his  thoughts  on  his  broth- 
er's trouble  and  keep  his  own  until  such  time  as  he 
could  deal  with  it;  and,  while  Graham  poured  out  his 
heart  —  going  over  his  story  of  the  Ita  Strabosck 
rescue  again  and  again  —  Peter  quietly  undressed  him, 
bit  by  bit.  "  Yes,  old  man,"  he  kept  saying,  "  I  quite 
understand;  but  what  you've  got  to  do  now  is  to  get 
to  bed  and  to  sleep.  Let  me  take  off  your  coat. 


LIFE  225 

That's  right.  Now  sit  down  for  a  second.  Now  let 
me  undo  your  shoes.  It's  a  jolly  good  thing  I  came 
home.  You  bet  your  life  I'll  stand  by  you  and  see 
you  through  —  you  bet  your  life  I  will!  " 

"  And  you  swear  you'll  not  say  anything  about  this 
to  mother  or  Belle,  and  especially  father  —  even  if 
I'm  ill, —  in  fact  to  any  one?  You  swear  it?" 

"Of  course,"  said  Peter. 

There  was  something  comical  as  well  as  pathetic  in 
the  sight  of  this  big  fellow  playing  the  woman  to  this 
distraught  boy, —  undoing  his  tie,  taking  off  his  collar 
and  gradually  getting  him  ready  for  bed.  It  was  a 
long  and  difficult  process  and  needed  consummate  tact, 
tender  firmness  and  quiet  determination.  A  hundred 
times  Graham  would  spring  to  his  feet  and  —  with 
one  shoe  on  and  one  shoe  off,  minus  coat  and  waist- 
coat, tie  and  collar  —  pace  the  room  from  end  to  end, 
gesticulating  wildly,  sending  out  a  torrent  of  words  in 
a  hoarse  whisper  —  sometimes  almost  on  the  verge 
of  tears.  He  was  only  twenty- four  —  not  much  more 
than  a  boy.  It  was  very  hard  luck  that  he  should  be 
up  against  so  sordid  a  slice  of  life  at  a  time  when  he 
stood  at  the  beginning  of  everything. 

But  Peter  knew  intuitively  that  it  was  absolutely 
necessary  for  Graham  to  rid  his  system  of  this  Stra- 
bosck  poison  and  empty  out  his  heart  and  soul  before 
he  could  be  put  to  sleep,  like  a  tired  child.  And  so, 
with  the  utmost  patience,  he  subjected  himself  to  play 
the  part  of  a  mental  as  well  as  a  physical  nurse.  Bet- 
ter than  that,  he  mothered  his  brother,  smoothed  him 
down,  sympathized  with  him,  assured  him  again  and 


226        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

again  that  he  had  done  the  only  possible  thing;  and 
finally  as  the  first  touch  of  dawn  crept  into  the  room 
had  the  infinite  satisfaction  of  putting  the  clothes 
about  his  brother's  shoulders  and  seeing  his  dark  head 
buried  in  his  pillow.  Even  then  he  was  not  wholly 
satisfied.  Creeping  upon  tip-toe  about  the  room  he 
laid  hands  on  Graham's  razors  and  put  them  in  his 
pocket.  He  was  possessed  with  a  sort  of  terror  that 
the  boy  might  wake  up  and,  acting  under  a  strong 
revulsion  of  feeling,  cut  his  throat.  It  must  be 
remembered  that  he  had  watched  a  human  being  under 
the  strain  and  stress  of  a  very  strong  and  terrible  emo- 
tion and  he  was  naturally  afraid.  He  knew  his  broth- 
er's excitable  temperament.  He  had  heard  him 
confess  that  the  girl  had  exercised  over  him  something 
more  than  mere  physical  attraction,  and  although  he 
was  no  psychologist  it  was  easy  for  him  to  see  that, 
for  a  time  at  any  rate,  Graham  was  just  as  ready  to 
hurt  himself  as  to  hurt  the  girl.  Some  one  had  to  be 
paid  out  for  his  suffering  and  it  was  Peter's  business 
to  see  that  his  brother,  at  any  rate,  escaped  punish- 
ment. Not  content  with  having  got  Graham  to  bed 
and  to  sleep  and  secured  the  razors  which  might  be 
used  in  a  moment  of  impetuousness,  Peter  stayed  on, 
sat  down  near  the  bed  and  listened  to  one  after  an- 
other of  the  sounds  of  the  great  city's  awakening.  It 
was  then  that  he  permitted  himself  to  think  back.  He 
didn't  remember  the  fracas  in  the  studio  apartment  or 
the  unpleasantness  of  the  place  with  the  unhealthy,  un- 
pleasant creatures  who  had  been  there.  He  repeated 
to  himself  over  and  over  again  the  words  —  the  cold, 


LIFE  227 

cruel  words  of  Ranken  Townsend, — "  So  this  was 
your  precious  business  engagement.  Well,  I  don't 
give  my  daughter  to  a  man  who  shares  her  with 
women  like  Papowsky,  so  you  may  consider  your- 
self free."  In  his  mind's  eye  he  could  see  the  tall 
artist  march  away.  He  felt  again  as  though  he  had 
been  kicked  in  the  mouth. 


II 

RANKEN  TOWNSEND  had  arranged  a  sitting  with 
Madame  Mascheri,  the  famous  opera  singer,  at  eleven 
o'clock.  He  entered  his  studio  at  ten,  and  the  first 
thing  he  did  was  to  ring  up  one  of  his  best  friends  and 
get  into  a  quarrel  with  him.  He  had  already  so  sur- 
prised his  old  servant  at  breakfast  that  she  had  retired 
to  the  kitchen  in  tears.  He  was  angry  and  sore  and 
there  was  likely  to  be  a  nice  clash  in  the  studio  when 
he  said  sharp  things  to  the  spoiled  lady  who  consid- 
ered that  all  men  were  in  their  proper  places  only  when 
they  were  at  her  feet. 

Ranken  Townsend  was  more  than  angry.  He  was 
disappointed  —  mentally  sick  —  completely  out  of  gear. 
He  had  seen  Peter  Guthrie  —  and  there  was  no  argu- 
ment about  the  fact  —  come  out  of  a  notorious  house, 
dishevelled  and  apparently  drunk.  It  was  a  sad  blow 
to  him.  A  bad  shock.  The  effects  of  it  had  kept  him 
awake  nearly  all  n%ht.  Betty  was  the  apple  of  his 
eye.  He  was  going  to  protect  her  at  all  costs,  and  he 
knew  that  in  doing  so  he  must  bring  great  unhappi- 


228        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ness  into  her  life.  He  had  believed  in  Peter  Guthrie. 
He  had  seemed  to  him  to  be  a  big,  strong,  clean,  hon- 
est, simple,  true  fellow  who  had  gone  straight  and  who 
meant  to  continue  to  go  straight.  It  meant  a  tre- 
mendous amount,  an  altogether  incalculable  amount 
to  him  as  a  father  to  have  found  that  his  estimate  was 
wrong.  He  realized  perfectly  well  that  his  words  had 
been  harsh  the  night  before.  He  detested  to  have 
been  obliged  to  say  them;  but,  for  the  sake  of  his  little 
girl,  he  was  not  going  back  on  them.  The  evidence 
was  too  strong. 

The  telephone  bell  rang.  He  stalked  across  to  it. 
"Well?"  he  said.  "What's  that?  Who  did  you 
say?  Send  him  up  at  once."  And  then,  with  his 
jaw  set  and  his  hands  thrust  deep  into  his  pockets, 
he  took  up  a  stand  in  the  middle  of  the  studio  and 
waited. 

It  was  Peter.  He  came  in  quietly  and  looked  very 
tired.  "  Good  morning,  Mr.  Townsend,"  he  said. 

The  answer  was  sharp  and  antagonistic.  "  I  don't 
agree  with  you." 

Peter  put  down  his  hat  and  stick,  went  up  to  the 
artist  and  stood  in  front  of  him  squarely  and  without 
fear.  "  You're  going  to  withdraw  what  you  said  last 
night." 

"You  think  so?" 

"  Yes." 

"Why?" 

"  Because  it  was  unjust  and  no  man  is  hanged  in 
these  times  before  he's  given  a  chance  to  defend  him- 
self." 


LIFE  229 

"  No  one  is  going  to  hang  you,  Peter  Guthrie. 
You've  hanged  yourself." 

"  No,  no,"  said  Peter,  "  that  won't  do.  It  isn't  like 
you  to  adopt  this  attitude  and  I  must  ask  you  to  treat 
me  properly." 

Townsend  shot  out  a  short  laugh.  "  There's  no 
need  for  you  to  ask  me  to  do  that.  My  treatment  of 
you  is  going  to  be  so  proper  that  this  is  going  to  be 
the  last  time  you'll  come  into  this  studio.  I've  done 
with  you.  So  far  as  I'm  concerned  you're  over. 
Betty  isn't  going  to  see  you  or  hear  from  you  again. 
I  consider  that  it  was  a  mighty  good  accident  that  took 
me  into  Fortieth  Street  last  night.  That's  all  I  have 
to  say." 

Peter  didn't  budge.  He  just  squared  his  shoulders 
and  tilted  his  chin  a  little  more.  "  I  don't  think  that's 
all  you've  got  to  say,"  he  said.  "  I  quite  understand 
that  you  had  a  bad  shock  when  you  saw  me  coming 
out  of  that  place  last  night.  If  I  were  in  your  shoes 
I  should  say  just  what  you're  saying  now." 

"  It's  something  to  win  your  approval,"  said  Town- 
send,  sarcastically,  "  and  I'm  sure  I'm  very  much 
obliged  to  you  for  coming  down  town  to  give  me  your 
praise." 

"  Oh,  don't  talk  like  that,"  said  Peter.  "  It  doesn't 
do  any  good  and  it  doesn't  help  to  clear  things  up." 

"  You  can't  clear  things  up.  Neither  of  us  can. 
You  began  by  lying  to  me  when  you  said  you  had  a 
business  engagement,  and  you  wound  up  by  coming 
out  drunk  of  the  rottenest  house  in  this  city.  And, 
see  here!  I  don't  like  your  tone.  I'm  not  standing 


230        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

here  to  be  reproved  by  you  for  my  attitude  in  this  mat- 
ter. I  might  be  more  inclined  to  give  you  a  chance  if 
you  made  a  clean  breast  of  it." 

"  I  wish  I  could,"  said  Peter,  "  but  I  can't.  All  I 
can  tell  you  is  that  I  had  to  go  to  that  place  last  night 
for  a  very  good  reason.  I'd  never  been  there  before 
and  I  shall  never  go  there  again.  I  hadn't  even  heard 
of  the  place  until  a  few  days  ago.  You've  got  to 
accept  my  word  of  honour  that  I  went  there  with  a 
friend  of  mine  to  get  a  man  who  means  a  very  great 
deal  to  me  out  of  bad  trouble." 

"  It's  taken  you  sometime  to  think  that  out,"  said 
Townsend,  brutally. 

Peter  winced  as  if  he  had  been  struck.  He  had 
gone  to  the  studio  under  the  belief  that  everything 
would  be  quite  easy.  He  was  honest.  His  conscience 
was  clear.  He  was  not  a  liar.  Surely  his  word 
would  be  accepted.  Whatever  happened  he  wasn't 
going  to  be  disloyal  to  his  brother.  Apart  from  the 
fact  that  he  had  sworn  not  to  give  Graham  away,  he 
wasn't  the  kind  that  blabbed.  He  tried  again,  still 
keeping  himself  well  under  control,  although  he  was 
unable  to  hide  the  fact  that  Ranken  Townsend's  utter 
disbelief  in  him  hurt  deeply. 

"  Mr.  Townsend,"  he  said,  "  I  don't  want  to  do  any- 
thing to  make  you  more  angry  than  you  are.  It's  per- 
fectly simple  for  you  to  say  that  you  won't  have  me 
marry  Betty.  But  remember  this:  I've  only  got  to 
go  to  Betty  and  ask  her  to  marry  me,  with  or  without 
your  consent,  and  she  will.  If  you  don't  believe  me, 
you  don't  know  Betty," 


LIFE  231 

"  Ah !  but  that's  exactly  where  you  make  your  mis- 
take," said  Townsend.  "  I  do  know  Betty.  And  let 
me  tell  you  this,  Peter  Guthrie:  My  girl  has  been 
brought  up.  She  hasn't  been  dragged  up  or  allowed 
to  bring  herself  up.  The  consequence  is  that  she's 
not  among  the  army  of  present-day  girls  who  look 
upon  their  fathers  and  mothers  as  any  old  trash  to 
be  swept  aside  and  over-ridden  whenever  it  suits  them 
to  do  so.  I'm  the  man  to  whom  she  owes  all  the  hap- 
piness and  comfort  that  she's  known.  I'm  the  man 
who's  proud  to  be  responsible  for  her,  to  whom  she 
belongs  and  who  knows  a  wide  stretch  more  of  life 
and  its  troubles  than  she  does, —  and,  not  being  an 
empty-headed,  individualistic,  precocious  little  fool, 
she  knows  it  too.  She  belongs  to  a  past  decade  —  to 
an  old-fashioned  family.  Therefore,  what  I  say  goes; 
and  if  I  tell  her  that,  for  a  very  good  reason,  I  don't 
want  her  to  have  anything  to  do  with  you,  she  will 
be  desperately  unhappy,  but  she'll  not  question  my 
authority  or  my  right  to  say  so.  These  are  facts,  how- 
ever absurd  and  strange  they  may  appear  to  you.  I 
think  it  would  be  a  damned  good  thing  if  other  fathers 
took  the  trouble  to  get  on  the  same  footing  with  their 
daughters.  There'd  be  less  unhappiness  and  fewer 
grave  mistakes  if  they  did."  He  was  almost  on  the 
verge  of  adding,  "  Look  at  your  sister  Belle  if  you 
don't  believe  me." 

Peter  had  nothing  to  say. 

The  two  men  stood  facing  one  another,  gravely,  in 
silence.  They  were  both  moved  and  stirred.  And 
then  Peter  nodded.  "  I'm  glad  you're  Betty's  father," 


232        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

he  said  at  last.  "  She  owes  you  more  than  she  can 
ever  pay  back.  I  give  you  my  word  that  I  shan't 
attempt  to  dispute  your  authority.  I  respect  you,  Mr. 
Townsend,  and  when  I  marry  Betty  I  want  to  have 
your  consent  and  approval.  I  also  give  you  my  word 
that  it  was  absolutely  necessary  for  me  to  go  to  Pa- 
powsky's  last  night,  without  any  explanation  what- 
ever. Are  you  going  to  take  it?" 

"No,"  said  Townsend;  "I'm  not.  Even  if  I'd 
known  you  for  years  what  you  ask  is  too  much  for  me 
to  swallow.  Good  Lord,  man !  can't  you  see  that  I'm 
protecting  my  daughter  —  the  one  person  I  love  in  this 
world  —  the  one  person  whose  happiness  means  more 
to  me  than  anything  on  earth  ?  Why  should  I  believe 
that  you're  different  from  other  young  men, —  the 
average  young  man  whom  I  see  every  day,  who  no 
more  cares  about  going  clean  to  the  woman  he  is  going 
to  marry  than  he  does  for  running  straight  afterwards? 
I  don't  know  you  and  hitherto  I've  accepted  you  on 
your  face  value.  When  it  comes  to  the  question  of 
a  man's  trusting  his  daughter  to  the  first  person  who 
comes  and  asks  him  for  her,  he's  got  to  be  pretty  sure 
of  what  he's  doing.  In  any  case,  I  don't  hold  with 
the  old  saying  that  '  young  men  will  be  young  men.' 
You  may  sow  your  wild  oats  if  you  like,  but  they're 
not  going  to  blossom  in  the  garden  of  a  little  girl  who 
belongs  to  me.  In  that  respect  I'm  as  narrow-minded 
as  a  Quaker.  And  let  me  tell  you  this  finally:  I 
know  the  sort  of  place  that  Papowsky's  is.  I  know 
what  goes  on  there  and  the  sort  of  people  who  fre- 
quent it.  To  my  mind  any  man  who's  seen  coming 


LIFE  233 

out  of  it  does  for  himself  as  the  future  husband  of 
any  good  girl.  If  you  have,  as  you  say,  a  good  reason 
for  going  there,  tell  it  to  me.  If  not,  get  out." 

The  artist  had  said  these  things  with  intense  feel- 
ing. Hard  as  they  were,  Peter  had  to  acknowledge 
that  they  were  right.  Just  for  one  instant  he  wav- 
ered. He  was  on  the  point  of  giving  the  whole  story 
away.  Then  his  loyalty  to  his  brother  came  back  to 
him.  He  would  rather  be  shot  than  go  back  on  the 
man  who  had  trusted  him  and  with  whom  he  had 
grown  up  with  such  deep  affection.  "  Very  well,"  he 
said,  "  that  settles  it.  I've  nothing  more  to  say.  But 
one  of  these  days  I'll  prove  that  my  word  of  honor 
was  worth  taking.  In  the  meantime,  you  can't  stop 
me  from  loving  Betty  and  you'll  never  be  able  to  stop 
Betty  from  loving  me." 

He  turned  on  his  heel,  took  up  his  hat  and  stick 
and  went  out. 

Ill 

GRAHAM  was  sitting  up  in  bed  when  Peter  returned 
to  his  room.  He  was  looking  about  him  with  an  ex- 
pression of  queer  surprise, —  puzzled  apparently  to 
find  himself  in  his  room. 

"Oh,  hello,  old  man!"  said  Peter.  "How  d'you 
feel?" 

Graham  put  his  hand  up  to  his  head.  "  I  don't 
know  yet.  Have  I  been  asleep?  I  thought  I'd  been 
in  a  railway  accident.  I  was  looking  about  for  the 
broken  girders  and  the  ghastly  signs  of  a  smash." 


234        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

He  got  slowly  out  of  bed,  put  on  his  slippers  and 
walked  up  and  down  for  a  few  minutes  with  a  heavy 
frown  on  his  face.  The  emotion  of  the  night  before 
had  left  its  marks.  He  stopped  in  front  of  a  chair 
on  the  back  of  which  his  evening  clothes  were  hang- 
ing neatly.  He  remembered  that  he  had  thrown  them 
off.  He  noticed  —  at  first  with  irritation  —  that  the 
things  on  his  dressing-table  had  been  re-arranged  — 
tampered  with.  It  didn't  look  as  he  liked  it  to  look. 
Something  had  been  taken  away.  It  dawned  on  him 
that  all  his  razors  had  been  removed.  "  Removed," 
—  the  word  sent  a  sort  of  electric  shock  through  his 
brain  as  it  passed  through.  He  went  over  to  the  win- 
dow and  looked  out  into  the  street.  The  sun  glorified 
everything  with  its  wonderful  touch.  Good  God! 
To  think  that  he  might  be  standing  at  that  very  mo- 
ment on  the  other  side  of  the  great  veil. 

"  I  don't  know  —  I  don't  know  what  to  say  to  you 
for  all  this,  Peter,"  he  said. 

Peter  sat  down,  thrust  his  hands  into  his  pockets 
and  his  long  legs  out  in  front  of  him.  Reaction  had 
set  in.  He  felt  depressed  and  wretched.  "  One  of 
these  days,"  he  said,  "  I  may  ask  you  to  do  the  same 
thing  for  me." 

Something  in  his  tone  made  Graham  turn  round 
sharply.  "What's  wrong?" 

"  Everything's  wrong,"  said  Peter.  "  But  I'll  tell 
you  some  other  time.  Your  affair  has  got  to  be  set- 
tled first." 

"  No ;  tell  me  now,"  said  Graham.  He  dreaded  to 
feel  that  he  was  the  cause  somehow  or  other  of  bring- 


LIFE  235 

ing  trouble  upon  his  brother.  Never  before  in  all  his 
life  had  he  seen  Peter  looking  like  that. 

"  Mr.  Townsend  happened  to  be  passing  Papowsky's 
last  night  and  saw  me  coming  out.  I'd  had  a  scrap 
up  in  the  studio  with  a  bunch  of  men  who  were  half 
drunk.  I  must  have  looked  like  it.  He  told  me  that 
he  wouldn't  have  me  marry  Betty,  and  he  repeated  it 
this  morning.  I've  just  come  away  from  his  place. 
That's  what's  the  matter  with  me." 

"  Oh,  curse  me !  "  cried  Graham.  "  Curse  me  for 
a  fool!" 

Peter  sprang  to  his  feet.  "  Don't  start  worrying 
about  me.  And  look  here;  don't  let's  waste  time  in 
trying  to  scrape  up  spilt  milk.  I'm  going  to  marry 
Betty,  that's  a  dead  certainty,  and  sooner  or  later  Mr. 
Townsend  will  withdraw  the  brutal  things  he  said  to 
me.  And  you're  going  to  wipe  your  slate  clean,  right 
away.  So  buck  up  and  get  busy,  old  man.  Have 
your  bath  and  get  dressed  as  soon  as  you  can.  I'm 
going  to  help  you  to  fix  your  affair  as  soon  as  you're 
ready." 

"  How  ?  "  asked  Graham. 

"  I  don't  know  quite.     I  think  I'll  ask  Kenyon." 

"  No,  don't.  Let's  do  it  together.  I  don't  want 
Kenyon  to  see, —  I  mean  I'd  rather  Kenyon  was  out 
of  it.  I'd  rather  that  you  were  the  only  one  to  look 
on  at  the  remainder  of  my  humiliation, —  that's  the 
word.  He  knows  quite  enough  as  it  is." 

"All  right!"  said  Peter.  "Hurry  up,  then. 
We'll  go  round  to  the  apartment  and  see  Ita  Stra- 
bosck.  I  cashed  a  cheque  on  the  way  back  from  Mr. 


236        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

Tovvnsend's.  We  can't  let  her  go  out  into  the  street 
with  nothing  in  her  pocket, —  that's  impossible." 

Graham  nodded.  He  couldn't  find  words  to  say 
what  he  felt  about  it  all.  There  was  a  look  of  acute 
pain  on  his  pale  face  as  he  went  into  the  bath-room. 

And  then  Peter  sat  down  at  his  brother's  table  and 
wrote  a  little  note  Lo  Betty : 

"  My  own  dearest  Baby : 

"  Something  has  happened  and  your  father  —  who's  a 
fine  fellow  and  well  worthy  of  you  —  believes  that  I'm 
such  a  rotter  that  he's  told  me  to  consider  myself 
scratched.  I'm  going  to  play  the  game  by  him  for  your 
sake  as  well  as  his.  Don't  worry  about  it.  Leave  every- 
thing to  me.  I  won't  ask  you  to  go  on  loving  me  and  be- 
lieving in  me,  because  that  you  must  do,  just  as  I  shall  go 
on  loving  you  and  believing  in  you.  It  has  to  be.  I've 
got  to  think  things  over  to  see  what  can  be  done. 

"  In  the  meantime,  and  as  long  as  I  live, 

"  Your  PETER." 

He  addressed  the  letter  and  put  the  envelope  in  his 
pocket.  Then  he  went  to  the  bath-room  and  called 
out:  "Old  man,  shall  I  have  some  breakfast  sent  up 
for  you?  "  The  answer  was,  "  No;  the  sight  of  food 
would  make  me  sick." 

Graham  dressed  quickly  and  nothing  more  was  said 
by  either  of  the  brothers  until  they  went  out  into  the 
street  together. 

"  We'll  get  a  cab,"  said  Peter. 

"No;  I'm  too  broke.     Let's  walk." 

And  so  they  walked  hard,  arm  in  arm.  It  seemed 
rather  an  insult  to  Graham  that  the  day  was  so  fine, 


LIFE  237 

the  sky  so  blue  and  equable  and  that  all  the  passers-by 
seemed  to  be  going  on  their  way  untroubled.  He'd 
have  been  better  pleased  if  the  day  had  been  dark  and 
ugly  and  if  everybody  had  been  hurrying  through  rain 
and  sleet.  His  own  mind  was  disturbed  by  a  storm 
of  the  most  unpleasant  thoughts.  The  girl  whom 
they  were  on  their  way  to  see  had  exercised  a  strong 
physical  fascination  over  him.  He  had  believed  in 
her  absolutely.  She  had  meant  a  great  deal  to  him. 
Her  deceit  and  cunning  selfishness  brought  pessimism 
into  his  soul.  It  was  a  bad  feeling. 

As  they  came  up  to  the  house  with  its  shabby  door, 
a  man  well-past  middle  age, —  a  flabby,  vulgar  person, 
with  thick  awkward  legs, —  left  it  rather  quickly  and 
walked  in  the  opposite  direction.  The  two  boys  went 
in  and  Peter  led  the  way  up  the  dark  staircase.  The 
door  was  open  and  Lily,  the  colored  maid,  was  hold- 
ing a  shrill  argument  with  a  man  with  a  basket  full  of 
empty  siphons  on  his  arm.  Her  face  broke  into  an 
odd  and  knowing  smile  when  she  saw  Graham.  They 
passed  her  without  a  word  and  went  along  the  passage 
into  the  sitting-room.  It  was  empty,  but  in  a  hideous 
state  of  disorder.  There  was  about  it  all  that  last 
night  look  which  is  so  unpleasant  and  insalubrious. 
The  windows  had  not  been  opened  and  the  room 
reeked  with  stale  tobacco  smoke  and  beer.  Cigar 
stumps  lay  like  dead  snails  on  the  carpet.  Empty 
bottles  were  everywhere  and  dirty  glasses.  Through 
the  half-open  door  which  led  into  the  bed-room  they 
heard  a  flutey,  uncertain  soprano  voice  singing  a  curi- 
ous foreign  song. 


238        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

After  a  moment  of  weakness  and  indecision, 
Graham  pulled  himself  together  and  called  out :  "  Ita ! 
Ita !  "  sharply. 

The  song  ceased  abruptly.  There  was  a  cry  of  well- 
simulated  joy  and  the  girl,  with  her  hair  frowzled  and 
a  thin  dressing-gown  over  her  night-dress,  ran  into 
the  room  with  naked  feet.  She  drew  up  short  when 
she  saw  the  expression  on  Graham's  face  and  Peter's 
square  shoulders  behind  him.  "  Somesing  ees  ze  mat- 
ter," she  said.  "  Oh,  tell  me !  "  Second  nature  and 
constant  practice  made  the  girl  begin  to  act.  This  was 
obviously  an  opportunity  for  being  dramatic. 

With  a  huge  effort  Graham  controlled  himself. 
"  I'm  giving  up  this  apartment  to-day,"  he  said. 

"  You  are  giving  up ?  " 

"  I  said  so." 

"And  what  ees  to  become  of  me?  You  take  me 
somewhere  else  ?  " 

"  No.  I  hope  I  shall  never  see  you  again  — 
never ! " 

The  girl  burst  forth.  How  well  he  knew  that 
piteous  gesture  —  that  pleading  voice  —  the  tears  that 
came  into  those  large  almond  eyes, —  all  those  tricks 
which  had  made  him  what  he  had  been  called  the  night 
before  at  Papowsky's  — "  a  boob."  "  What  'ave  I 
done?  Do  you  not  love  me  any  more?  I  love  you. 
I  will  die  for  you.  You  are  everysing  to  me.  Do  not 
leave  me  to  ze  mercy  of  ze  world.  Graham! 
Graham !  My  saviour !  I  love  you  zo !  " 

Graham  shook  her  off.  "  Please  don't,"  he  said. 
"  Just  pack  your  things  and  dress  yourself.  All  I've 


LIFE  239 

got  to  say  to  you  is  that  I've  found  you  out.  Perhaps 
you'd  better  go  back  to  Papowsky's.  You're  very 
clever, —  they  all  say  so  there.  Find  another  damned 
young  fool  —  that'll  be  easy." 

The  girl  suddenly  threw  back  her  head  and  broke 
into  an  amazing  laugh.  The  sound  of  it, —  so  merry 
—  so  full  of  a  sort  of  elfin  amusement, —  was  as  start- 
ling to  the  two  boys  as  though  a  bomb  had  been 
dropped  into  the  room.  "  I  could  not  find  such  a 
damned  fool  as  you,"  she  said  loudly  and  coarsely, 
"  eef  I  'unted  the  earth.  Eef  you  'ad  waited  to  come 
until  to-night  you  would  'ave  found  zis  little  nest 
empty  and  ze  bird  flown.  There  ees  a  better  boob  zan 
you.  Perhaps  you  met  'im  going  out.  'E  marries 
me  to-morrow.  I  vas  to  keep  zat  for  a  leetle  surprise. 
Oh,  yes,  I  am  clever,  and  eet  kills  me  with  laughing 
to  zee  you  stand  there  like  a  school  teacher.  You 
turn  over  a  new  leaf  now,  eh?  Zat  ees  good.  Zo  do 
I.  To-morrow  I  am  a  wife.  I  marry  a  man.  My 
time  with  babies  ees  over." 

She  picked  up  a  glass  that  was  half- full  of  beer  and 
with  a  gesture  of  supreme  contempt  jerked  it  into 
Graham's  face.  Then,  with  the  quickness  of  an  eel, 
she  returned  to  her  bedroom  and  slammed  the  door. 
They  heard  her  laughing  uncontrollably. 

Graham  wiped  his  face  with  his  handkerchief,  and 
dropped  it  on  the  floor  with  a  shiver.  "  I  shan't  want 
to  borrow  any  money  from  you,  Peter,"  he  said  in  a 
low  voice.  "  Let's  go." 

And  they  went  out  into  the  street  together  —  into 
the  sun,  and  took  a  long  breath  of  relief  —  a  long, 


240        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

clean  breath,  untainted  by  stale  tobacco  smoke  and 
beer  and  the  pungent  scent  of  Ita  Strabosck. 

Peter  made  no  attempt  to  put  into  words  his  intense 
sympathy,  but  he  took  his  brother's  arm  and  held  it 
tight,  and  Graham  was  very  grateful.  Right  out  of 
the  very  bottom  of  his  heart  two  tears  welled  up  into 
his  eyes  as  he  walked  away. 

After  all,  he  was  only  twentyrfour. 


IV 

ON  her  way  up  to  her  room  that  night,  Ethel  drew 
up  short  outside  Graham's  bedroom  door.  She  knew 
that  he  was  in,  which  was  in  itself  unusual.  She 
thought  there  must  be  something  the  matter,  because 
she  had  seen  Graham  leave  the  house  in  the  morning 
long  after  his  usual  time.  She  had  also  watched  his 
face  at  dinner  and  had  seen  in  it  something  that  fright- 
ened her.  It  was  true  that  Peter  was  her  favorite 
brother,  but  she  was  very  fond  of  and  had  great  ad- 
miration for  Graham.  Also  she,  herself,  was  in  trouble. 
Trouble  seemed  to  be  an  epidemic  in  that  family.  Her 
Knight  Errant  next  door,  in  spite  of  her  signalling  and 
the  fact  that  she  had  laid  out  as  usual  the  cigarettes 
and  the  candies,  had  deserted  her.  In  order  to  receive 
his  visits  and  feed  herself  on  the  excitement  with  which 
they  provided  her,  she  was  still  maintaining  her  pre- 
tence of  invalidism,  and  the  worst  of  it  was  she  now 
knew  that  she  had  grown  to  be  very  fond  of  the  boy, 
who  at  first  had  only  been  a  source  of  amusement. 


LIFE  241 

So,  with  a  fellow-feeling  for  Graham,  she  listened 
outside  his  door.  She  wanted  very  badly  to  slip  in 
and  give  her  sympathy  to  her  brother  and  receive  some 
of  it  from  him.  She  didn't  feel  quite  as  individual- 
istic as  usual.  The  artificiality  of  the  flapper  left  her 
for  the  time  being  and  she  felt  as  young  as  she  really 
was  and  rather  helpless,  and  awfully  lonely. 

Hearing  nothing,  she  tapped  gently  on  the  door, 
opened  it  and  went  in.  Graham  was  sitting  in  an  arm- 
chair with  his  elbows  on  his  knees  and  his  head  be- 
tween his  hands.  He  made  a  picture  of  wretched- 
ness which  would  have  melted  the  heart  of  a  sphinx. 
Ethel  went  over  to  him  and  put  her  hand  on  his 
shoulder.  "  Is  anything  the  matter,  Hammie  ?  "  she 
asked,  using  the  nickname  that  she  had  given  him  as 
a  child. 

Graham  didn't  look  up.  "  Oh,  Lord,  no !  "  he  said, 
with  a  touch  of  impatience.  "  What  should  be  the 
matter?  "  But  he  was  very  glad  to  feel  that  touch  of 
friendliness  on  his  shoulders. 

"  Can  I  do  anything  for  you  ?  " 

"  Oh,  no.     I'm  all  right  —  as  right  as  rain." 

Ethel  knew  better.  She  knew  also  that  she  would 
have  said  those  very  things  to  Belle  if  she  had  been 
caught  in  a  similar  state  of  depression.  So  she  sat 
down  on  the  arm  of  Graham's  chair  and  put  her  hand 
against  his  cheek.  "  I've  got  about  a  hundred  and 
seventy-five  dollars,  if  that's  any  good  to  you,"  she 
said. 

Graham  gave  a  scoffing  laugh,  but  all  the  same  he 
was  very  grateful  for  the  offer.  "  My  dear  kid,"  he 


242        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

said,  "  a  hundred  and  seventy-five  dollars  —  that's  no 
better  than  a  dry  bone  to  a  hungry  man." 

"Is  it  as  bad  as  all  that,  Hammie?" 

"  Yes,  and  then  some." 

Ethel  thought  deeply  for  a  few  minutes.  Her  char- 
acteristic selfishness,  which  had  been  almost  tenderly 
encouraged  at  school,  had  given  way  temporarily  be- 
fore her  own  disappointment.  "  Well,"  she  said 
finally,  "  I've  got  four  brooches  and  five  rings,  a  watch 
and  a  dressing-case.  You  can  sell  them  all  if  you 
like." 

Then  Graham  turned  round,  gave  his  little  sister 
one  short,  affectionate  look  and  put  his  head  down  on 
her  shoulder.  "  Don't  say  anything,  please,"  he  said. 
"  Just  let  me  stay  here  for  a  minute.  It  does  me 
good." 

And  he  stayed  there  for  many  minutes,  and  the  two 
sat  silently  and  quietly,  getting  from  each  other  in  their 
mutual  trouble  the  necessary  help  which  both  needed 
so  much.  A  strange,  new  feeling  of  motherliness  stole 
over  the  girl.  It  surprised  her.  It  was  almost  like 
being  in  church  on  Christmas  Eve,  or  listening  to  the 
most  beautiful  melody. 

It  was  a  long  time  since  these  two  had  taken  the 
trouble  to  meet  each  other  half-way.  The  thoughts  of 
both  went  back  to  those  good  hours  when  Graham  had 
put  his  little  sister  on  a  sled  in  front  of  him  and  pushed 
her,  laughing  merrily,  over  the  hard  snow  in  the  park. 
He  had  never  even  dreamed  in  those  days  of  money 
and  the  fever  that  it  brings,  or  women  and  the  pain 
they  make. 


LIFE  243 

And  then  Graham  got  up,  just  a  little  ashamed  of 
himself, —  after  all,  he  was  now  a  man  of  the  world, — 
and  saw  that  Ethel's  cheeks  were  wet  with  tears.  It 
was  his  turn  to  try  and  help.  "  Good  Lord !  "  he  said. 
"  You  don't  mean  to  say  that  you're  worried  about 
anything.  What  is  it  ?  " 

She  shook  her  head  and  turned  her  face  away. 
"  Oh,  nothing  —  nothing  at  all." 

All  the  same  she  felt  much,  ever  so  much  better  for 
the  kiss  that  he  gave  her,  and  went  along  to  her  own 
room  half-determined  to  be  honest  with  herself  and 
go  back  to  school  the  next  day.  She  was  rather 
startled  to  find  the  smell  of  cigarette  smoke  in  her 
bedroom,  which  was  in  darkness.  She  turned  up  the 
nearest  light  and  almost  gave  a  cry  of  joy  when  she 
found  the  boy  from  next  door  sitting  on  the  window- 
sill. 

"  Jack !  "  she  cried.  "  I  thought  you  were  —  I 
thought  you  had " 

Jack  threw  his  cigarette  out  of  the  window  and  got 
up  awkwardly.  "  I  got  your  note  just  now,"  he  said, 
"  and  so  I've  come." 

Ethel  went  to  the  door  and  locked  it.  All  the  clouds 
had  rolled  away.  She  was  very  happy.  She  had  evi- 
dently made  a  mistake.  He  must  have  been  prevented 
from  coming.  She  wished  he'd  given  her  time  to 
powder  her  nose  and  arrange  the  curls  about  her  ears. 
As  it  was,  she  opened  the  box  of  cigarettes  and  held 
out  the  candies  to  him. 

"  No,  thanks,"  said  Jack.  "  I'm  off  chocolates  and 
I've  knocked  off  smoking  to  a  great  extent." 


244        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

With  a  womanly  touch  which  she  and  all  women 
have  inherited  from  Eve,  who  never  forgot  to  stand 
with  her  back  to  the  sun  and  took  care,  if  possible, 
to  remain  in  the  woods  until  after  breakfast,  Ethel 
turned  on  a  shaded  light  and  switched  off  the  strong 
overhead  glare  which  made  her  look  every  day  of  her 
fifteen  years.  Then  she  sat  down  with  the  light  over 
her  left  shoulder.  She  was  quite  herself  again.  All 
was  well  with  the  world. 

"Where  have  you  been?"  she  asked,  a  little  im- 
periously. 

"  Nowhere,"  said  Jack. 

"  Then  why  haven't  you  been  to  see  me  ?  I  have 
signalled  every  night.  I  can't  understand  it." 

"  I  know  you  can't.     That's  why  I've  stayed  away." 

Ethel  was  puzzled  at  the  boy's  solemn  tone.  "Of 
course,  if  you  don't  want  to  come,  please  don't.  I 
wouldn't  drag  you  here  against  your  will  for  any- 
thing." 

"  Yes,  but  I  do  want  to  come.  I  stay  away  for 
your  sake,  and  I'm  not  coming  again  after  this  even- 
ing." 

That  was  exactly  what  Ethel  wanted  to  hear.  She'd 
been  afraid  that  Jack  had  found  some  one  else.  Now 
she  knew  differently.  "  Don't  be  silly,"  she  said. 
"  Have  a  cigarette.  Come  and  sit  on  the  sofa  and 
don't  let's  waste  time." 

But  Jack  didn't  move.  He  had  gone  back  to  the 
windowsill  and  remained  hunched  up  on  the  narrow 
ledge,  holding  on  with  both  hands.  "  I'm  off  in  a 
minute,"  he  said.  "  I'm  just  going  to  tell  you  one  or 


LIFE  245 

two  things  before  I  go.  Would  you  like  to  hear 
them?" 

"  If  they're  pleasant,"  she  said. 

"  Well,  they're  not  pleasant." 

"  Well,  then,  tell  me." 

For  a  moment  or  two  Jack  remained  silent.  Per- 
haps he  was  trying  to  find  careful  words  into  which  to 
put  his  thoughts.  When  finally  he  spoke  it  was  with 
a  suppressed  emotion  that  sent  a  quiver  through  the 
quiet  room.  "  I  can't  stand  coming  here/'  he  said. 
"  I  can't  stand  it.  I  don't  know  what  you  are  — 
whether  you're  a  mere  baby  who  knows  nothing,  or 
an  absolute  little  rotter.  You  tell  me  I  can  say  what 
I  think,  so  I'm  going  to."  He  got  tip  and  went  a  little 
nearer  to  the  sofa.  "  What  d'you  think  I'm  made 
of?  Look  at  yourself  in  the  glass  and  then  see 
whether  you're  the  sort  of  a  girl  who  can  let  a  man 
into  her  bedroom  night  after  night  for  nothing.  I 
tell  you  I  can't  stand  it.  I  stayed  away,  not  because 
I  wanted  to,  but  because  I  didn't  want  to  do  you  any 
harm.  I  was  a  fool  for  coming  here  at  all.  If  I 
didn't  believe  that  you  are  simply  a  silly  girl  I'd  stay 
to-night  and  come  every  night  as  I  used  to  do,  but 
I'm  going  to  give  you  the  benefit  of  the  doubt.  Next 
time  you  signal  to  a  man  take  care  to  find  out  what 
he's  made  of  and  be  a  bit  more  careful.  There,  now 
you've  got  it.  Good  night  and  good-bye.  I've  a 
darned  good  mind  to  put  the  note  you  sent  me  to-night 
in  an  envelope  and  address  it  to  your  mother.  It 
would  save  some  other  fellow  from  a  good  deal  of 
unnecessary  discomfort.  I'm  frightfully  sorry  to  be 


246        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

so  brutal,  but  I  don't  believe  you  know  what  you're 
doing.  Perhaps  this'll  be  a  lesson  to  you." 

He  turned  quickly,  swung  himself  out,  went  up  the 
rope  ladder  hand  over  hand  and  drew  it  up  after  him. 

Ethel  closed  her  eyes  and  sat  rigid.  The  boy  might 
have  planted  his  fist  in  her  face. 


V 

KENYON  had  taken  Mrs.  Guthrie  and  Belle  to  the 
Thirty-ninth  Street  Theatre  that  night.  A  quiet  little 
romantic  play,  quite  unpretentiously  written,  had 
found  its  way  to  that  theatre  either  by  accident  or  as 
a  stop-gap.  The  manager  who  put  it  there  had  ar- 
ranged, even  before  the  opening  performance,  to  re- 
place it  at  the  end  of  the  week  with  something  which 
had  a  punch, —  a  coarse,  vulgar,  artificial  piece  of 
mechanism  such  as  he  had  been  in  the  habit  of  pro- 
ducing all  of  his  managerial  life.  His  intention  to 
do  this  was  strengthened  by  the  press  notices,  which 
all  agreed  that  the  new  piece  was  a  very  little  play 
about  nothing  in  particular  and  which  made  too  great 
a  demand  upon  the  imagination  of  its  audience.  That 
last  remark  of  the  critics  was  worth  a  million  dollars 
to  the  play's  author.  The  theatre  remained  almost 
empty  until  the  Friday  night  of  its  first  —  and  if  the 
manager  had  anything  to  do  with  it  —  only  week.  The 
scenery  for  the  new  production  was  already  stacked 
on  the  stage.  But  to  the  amazement  of  all  concerned, 
except  the  author,  the  theatre  did  business.  The  house 


LIFE  247 

was  almost  full  and  the  box  office  was  so  busy  that 
the  young  man  who  looked  after  it, —  a  past-master 
in  rudeness, —  became  quite  querulous.  On  Saturday 
night  there  was  a  full  house  and  the  booking  was  so 
big  for  the  following  week  that  the  notices  of  with- 
drawal were  taken  down  and  the  play  with  a  punch 
had  to  find  another  home.  The  manager,  greatly  put 
out,  watched  this  little  play  sail  into  a  big,  steady  suc- 
cess, and  whenever  his  numerous  acquaintances  —  he 
had  no  friends  —  caught  him  in  an  unbusy  moment, 
he  would  say :  "  I  can't  make  it  out.  It  beats  me. 
Look  at  the  notices.  I  couldn't  understand  a  word  of 
the  thing  when  I  read  it.  I  only  put  it  into  the  theatre 
to  keep  it  warm.  My  word,  I  don't  know  what  the 
public  wants."  He  didn't,  and  he  never  would.  But 
the  author  knew.  He  had  made  a  play  which  appealed 
to  the  imagination  of  his  audience. 

Peter  had  watched  the  party  go  to  the  theatre  after 
an  early  dinner;  had  seen  Graham  go  up  to  his  room 
and  his  father  drive  away  to  a  meeting  at  the  Academy 
of  Medicine;  and  then,  anxious  to  be  alone  and  think 
things  over,  he  too  left  the  house  for  a  long,  hard 
tramp.  He  went  into  the  park  and  walked  round  and 
round  the  reservoir.  The  night  was  fine  and  clear, 
and  up  in  the  sky,  which  was  pitted  with  stars,  a  young 
moon  lay  on  her  back.  From  all  sides  the  music  of 
traffic  came  to  his  ears  in  a  never-ceasing  refrain,  and 
high  up  he  could  see  the  numerous  electric  signs  which 
came  and  went  with  steady  precision  and  monotony. 
Every  now  and  then  he  caught  sight  of  the  Plaza, 
whose  windows  all  seemed  to  be  alight.  It  gave  a 


248        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

peculiar  touch  of  fantasy  to  that  side  of  the 
Park. 

Peter  found  himself  thinking  of  some  of  the  things 
which  Ranken  Townsend  had  said  to  him.  Without 
bitterness,  and  certainly  without  anger,  he  began  to 
see  something  in  the  artist's  bluntness  which  gradually 
made  him  long,  with  a  sort  of  boyish  anguish,  to  go 
in  to  his  own  father.  The  more  he  thought  about 
this  the  more  it  seemed  to  him  right  and  necessary  and 
urgent  to  beard  the  Doctor  in  his  den  and  break  down 
the  curious  barrier  which  shyness  had  erected  between 
him  and  his  children.  He  realized  at  that  moment 
that  he  stood  desperately  in  need  of  a  father's  help 
and  advice.  It  was  quite  obvious  to  him  also  that 
Graham  needed  these  things  even  more  than  he  did. 
If  only  they  could  both  go  to  that  wise  and  good  man 
who  stood  aloof  and  get  something  more  from  him 
than  the  mere  money  with  which  he  was  so  generous. 
He  knew  —  no  one  better  —  that  he  always  received 
from  his  mother  the  most  tender  sympathy,  but  how 
could  he  discuss  with  her  some  of  the  things  with 
which  he  was  faced  since  the  Ita  Strabosck  episode 
had  come  into  his  life?  Kenyon  had  done  much  to 
make  it  plain  to  him  that  it  was  not  good  to  continue 
to  walk  in  blank  ignorance  of  the  vital  facts  with  which 
his  father  dealt  daily.  He  was  a  man  and  he  had  to 
live  in  the  world.  His  boyish  days  among  boys  were 
over.  They  belonged  to  the  past. 

It  was  borne  in  upon  him  as  he  went  round  and 
round  the  wide  stretch  of  placid  water  in  which  was 
reflected  the  moon  and  stars,  that  his  father  should 


LIFE  249 

know  all  about  Graham.  Certain  things  that  Kenyon 
had  said  stuck  to  his  mind  like  burrs.  If  he  could 
persuade  Graham  to  make  a  clean  breast  of  it  to  the 
Doctor,  the  brother  who  meant  so  much  to  him  might 
be  saved  from  a  disaster  which  would  not  merely  af- 
fect himself,  but  others, —  a  wife  and  children  per- 
haps. Kenyon  had  hinted  at  this  and  the  hint  was 
growing  in  Peter's  mind  like  an  abscess.  It  was  time 
that  he  and  his  brother  faced  facts  and  knew  them. 
Who  could  initiate  them  better  than  the  distinguished 
doctor  whose  life  had  been  devoted  to  such  serious 
questions  ? 

Having  brought  himself  up  to  this  point  and  being 
also  tremendously  anxious  to  tell  his  father  of  the 
position  in  which  he  stood  with  Mr.  Townsend,  Peter 
determined  to  strike  while  the  iron  was  hot  —  to  go 
home  and  see  his  father  at  once.  He  left  the  park 
quickly,  and  when  finally  he  let  himself  into  the  house 
was  astonished  to  see  how  late  it  was.  The  servant 
told  him  that  his  mother  and  sister  had  come  back 
from  the  theatre  and  had  gone  to  bed.  "  Mr.  Ken- 
yon," he  added,  "  came  back,  but  went  out  again  at 
once.  Mr.  Graham  went  to  bed  early  and  the  Doctor 
has  not  returned  yet." 

"Good!"  thought  Peter.  "Then  I'll  wait  for 
him."  He  gave  up  his  hat  and  stick,  went  through 
the  quiet,  dimly  lit  library,  and  after  a  moment's  hesi- 
tation opened  the  door  of  the  Blue  Room, —  that  room 
in  which  he  had  been  so  seldom,  hitherto  only  under 
protest.  He  had  opened  the  door  quietly  and  was 
astonished  to  see  Graham  sitting  at  his  father's  desk 


250        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

with  the  light  from  a  reading  lamp  shining  on  his  dark 
head.  "By  Jove,  Graham!"  he  said.  "You  must 
have  been  thinking  my  thoughts.  This  is  extraor- 
dinary." 

Graham  looked  up  with  a  start  and  thrust  some- 
thing under  the  blotting-pad.  His  face  went  as  white 
as  a  sheet  and  he  stammered  a  few  incoherent  words. 

Quite  unconscious  of  his  brother's  curious  embar- 
rassment, Peter  sat  on  the  corner  of  the  desk.  "  I've 
had  it  out  with  myself  to-night,"  he  said,  going,  as 
he  always  did,  straight  to  the  point.  "  I've  made  up 
my  mind  to  make  father  into  a  father  from  now  on- 
wards. I  can't  stand  this  detached  business  any 
longer.  Let's  both  wait  for  him  and  have  it  out." 

"  What  d'you  mean  ?  "  asked  Graham.  "  I  don't 
get  you."  He  put  his  hand  out  surreptitiously  and 
scrunched  up  one  of  the  sheets  of  note  paper  on  which 
he  had  been  writing. 

"  Listen ! "  said  Peter,  with  intense  earnestness. 
"  I've  got  to  know  things.  So  have  you.  I've  got 
to  have  advice.  I've  got  to  be  treated  as  a  human  be- 
ing. What's  the  good  of  our  having  a  father  at  all 
if  we  don't  get  something  from  him?  I  don't  mean 
money  and  a  roof,  clothes  and  tilings  to  eat.  I  mean 
help.  I'm  in  a  hole  about  Betty.  I  want  to  talk 
about  my  work  —  about  my  future.  Graham,  let's 
give  father  a  chance.  Many  times  he  seems  to  me  to 
have  fumbled  and  been  on  the  point  of  asking  us  to 
meet  him  half-way.  Well,  I'm  going  to  do  so.  Stay 
here  and  let's  both  see  it  through.  Have  the  pluck 
to  tell  him  about  your  trouble  and  throw  the  whole 


LIFE  251 

responsibility  on  him.  It's  his  and  he  ought  to  have 
it.  Wait  a  second.  Listen!  If  Ranken  Townsend 
had  been  your  father  you  never  would  have  gone  near 
Papowsky.  You  wouldn't  have  come  within  a  thou- 
sand miles  of  Ita  Strabosck  —  that's  a  certainty." 

Graham  got  up  quickly,  but  kept  his  hand  heavily 
on  the  blotting-pad.  "  No,"  he  said  almost  hysteri- 
cally. "  Count  me  out.  I'm  not  in  this.  It's  no  good 
our  trying  to  alter  father  at  this  time  of  day  —  it's  too 
late.  He's  microbe  mad.  He  knows  nothing  what- 
ever about  sons  and  daughters.  I  could  no  more  tell 
him  about  the  mess  I'm  in  than  fly  over  the  moon. 
He'd  turn  and  curse  me  —  that's  all  he'd  do.  He'd 
get  up  and  preach,  or  something.  He  doesn't  under- 
stand anything  about  life.  I'd  a  jolly  sight  rather 
go  to  mother,  only  I  know  it  would  hurt  her  so,  and 
anyway  my  story  isn't  fit  for  her  ears.  No;  cut  me 
out,  I  tell  you.  I'm  not  in  this." 

Peter  got  up  and  put  his  hands  strongly  on  his 
brother's  shoulders.  He  didn't  notice  then  how  near 
he  was  to  a  breakdown.  "  Graham,  old  man,  you've 
got  to  be  —  you've  just  got  to  be.  What  Kenyon 
said  is  true.  You  and  I  are  blind  and  are  damned 
children  wandering  about  —  stumbling  about.  We 
need  —  we  absolutely  need  a  father  more  than  ever  we 
did  in  our  lives.  So  do  Belle  and  Ethel.  We  all 
think  that  we  can  go  alone,  and  we  can't.  I  know  I'm 
right  —  I  just  know  it  —  so  you've  got  to  stay." 

A  puff  of  wind  came  through  the  open  window. 
Several  pieces  of  paper  fluttered  off  the  desk  and  fell 
softly  on  the  floor.  Peter  stooped  and  picked  them 


252        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

up.  On  them  the  words  "  Hunter  G.  Guthrie  "  had 
been  written  over  and  over  again. 

He  laughed  as  he  looked  at  them.  "  What  on  earth 
has  father  been  writing  his  name  all  over  these  sheets 
for  ?  How  funny !  What  a  strange  old  chap  he  seems 
to  be.  It's  a  sort  of  undergraduate  trick,  this, — 
practising  a  signature  before  writing  a  first  cheque." 

"  Give  'em  to  me !  "  said  Graham  sharply,  and  he 
tried  to  snatch  them  away.  His  voice  was  hoarse  and 
his  hand  shook. 

Peter  looked  at  him  in  great  surprise.  It  was  im- 
possible for  him  not  to  be  aware  of  the  fact  that  some- 
thing was  dreadfully  wrong.  As  he  stood  and  looked 
into  his  brother's  guilty  face  the  fact  which  stood  out 
most  clearly  was  that  Graham  had  himself  been  writ- 
ing his  father's  signature  all  over  those  sheets  of  pa- 
per. Why?  A  man  did  a  thing  of  that  sort  for  one 
reason  only. 

He  seized  Graham's  hand  which  was  pressed  on  the 
blotting-pad,  jerked  it  up,  pushed  the  blotting-pad 
aside  and  picked  up  the  cheque-book  that  laid  beneath 
it. 

"  Don't  touch  that,"  cried  Graham,  "  for  God's  sake ! 
Let  me  have  it !  I'll  tear  out  the  cheque.  I  think  I 
was  mad.  Oh,  God!  I'm  so  worried  I  didn't  know 
what  I  was  doing ! " 

There  was  a  struggle,  quick  and  sharp,  and  in  an 
instant  Graham  found  himself  staggering  across  the 
room  backwards. 

With  his  heart  standing  still,  Peter  opened  the  thin, 
narrow,  brown-covered  book.  A  cheque  for  three 


LIFE  253 

thousand  dollars  had  been  made  out  to  Graham  Guth- 
rie.  The  signature  had  been  forged. 

"  You've  done  this,"  he  said.  "  You've  actu- 
ally  " 

Graham  was  up  on  his  feet.  His  lips  were  trem- 
bling. He  put  out  a  shaking  hand.  "  My  God !  " 
he  whispered.  "  Father's  in  the  library." 

The  sound  of  the  Doctor's  thin,  clear  voice  came 
through  the  half-open  door.  Frozen  with  fear,  Gra- 
ham seemed  to  be  unable  to  move.  His  very  lips  had 
lost  their  colour. 

With  an  overwhelming  anxiety  to  hide  his  brother's 
frightful  fall  from  honesty  and  sanity,  Peter  pounced 
on  the  little  book,  thrust  it  into  Graham's  pocket, 
snatched  up  the  give-away  slips  of  paper,  tore  them 
into  small  pieces  and  threw  them  in  the  basket. 

"  Don't  give  me  away.  Don't  let  him  know.  If 
you  do,  I  swear  to  God  you'll  never  see  me  again ! " 

There  was  still  something  to  be  done,  and  Peter  did 
it.  He  took  his  brother  up  in  his  arms,  realizing  that 
he  was,  in  a  way,  paralyzed,  carried  him  to  a  chair 
that  was  out  of  the  ring  of  light  and  sat  him  down. 
"  Get  yourself  in  hand,  quick,"  he  whispered. 
"Quick,  now!" 

And  Graham,  strengthened  by  his  brother's  vitality, 
forced  himself  into  some  sort  of  control. 

Striding  to  the  fireplace,  Peter  stood  there  waiting 
for  his  father,  with  a  strange  pain  going  through  his 
body.  He  felt  just  as  though  he  had  been  told  that 
Graham,  his  best  pal  and  dear  brother,  had  had  an 
appalling  accident  and  might  not  live. 


254 

The  Doctor's  voice,  as  he  gave  directions  to  a  serv- 
ant, came  nearer  and  nearer. 


VI 

WITH  his  hand  on  the  handle  of  the  door,  the  Doctor 
paused.  "  I  want  you  to  call  me  to-morrow  at  half- 
past-seven,  Alfred.  Don't  forget.  I  have  a  busy  day. 
Good-night." 

The  two  boys  watched  him  come  into  the  room. 
His  head  was  high  and  there  was  a  little  smile  round 
his  usually  straight  mouth.  He  walked  with  a  sort  of 
sprightliness,  as  though  moving  to  music.  He  looked 
extraordinarily  young  and  exhilarated. 

He  saw  what  was  to  him  a  most  unusual  sight  in 
that  quiet,  lonely  work-room.  He  was  surprised  into 
an  exclamation  of  great  pleasure,  and  he  quickened 
his  pace  until  he  stood  between  his  sons.  Graham  got 
up  and  put  on  a  nervous,  polite  smile.  "  This's  what 
I  most  wanted,"  said  the  Doctor, — "  my  two  boys 
waiting  for  me  here  in  this  room.  I  can't  tell  you  — 
I  can't  tell  you,  Peter,  and  Graham,  how  often,  how 
strongly,  how  eagerly  I've  wished  to  see  you  where 
you  are  now.  I  can't  tell  you  how  I've  longed  to  have 
you  here  after  my  meetings,  to  tell  you  how  I'm  get- 
ting on,  moving  things  fonvard,  and  to  ask  you  share 
in  my  successes.  My  dear  Peter  —  my  dear  Gra- 
ham." 

It  was  pitiful.  The  strange,  almost  incoherent  out- 
break of  the  shy  man  nearly  made  Peter  burst  into 


LIFE  255 

tears.  He  would  almost  rather  his  father  had  treated 
them  coldly  and  with  raised  eyebrows.  His  present 
attitude  —  his  unhidden  joy  —  his  eager,  and  even 
wistful  welcome,  had  in  it  something  of  tragedy,  be- 
cause it  showed  all  the  waste  of  years  during  which 
the  sympathy  and  the  complete,  necessary  and  beau- 
tiful understanding  of  these  three  might  have  been 
welded  into  one  great,  insurmountable  rock. 

The  Doctor,  with  an  obvious  desire  to  play  host, — 
an  intuition  which  again  touched  Peter  deeply, —  went 
quickly  to  a  little  chest  which  stood  in  a  corner  of  the 
room.  "  What  will  you  have  ?  "  he  asked  anxiously. 
"  I've  got  a  very  good  cigar  here,  or  cigarettes  if  you 
would  like  them  better.  Let  me  see!  What  do  you 
smoke,  Peter?  " 

"  He  doesn't  even  know  what  I  smoke,"  thought 
Peter.  "  A  pipe,"  he  said. 

"  Oh,  yes,  yes !  Well,  this  is  generally  said  to  be 
a  very  good  mixture.  Try  some."  He  gave  a  jar 
of  tobacco  to  Peter.  "  These  are  nice,  though  per- 
haps they  are  a  little  too  dry."  And  he  extended  a 
box  of  cigars  to  Graham. 

The  boy  helped  himself,  trying  to  keep  his  hand 
steady.  "  Thank  you,"  he  said. 

"  And  now,"  said  the  Doctor,  "  let's  sit  down  and 
have  a  long  yarn.  Shall  we?  I  would  like  to  tell 
you  about  to-night.  The  meeting  was  of  vital  interest 
and  importance."  He  drew  his  chair  forward  so  that 
it  might  be  between  those  of  the  two  boys.  He  looked 
from  Peter's  face  to  Graham's  as  though  afraid  that 
he  was  asking  too  great  a  favour.  "  You  —  you'll 


256        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

forgive  my  talking  about  myself,  I'm  sure  —  at  least 
I  hope  you  will.  I  so  seldom  have  the  opportunity, — 
with  those  I  love,  I  mean  —  with  those  for  whom  I'm 
working.  To  see  you  here  like  this,  at  last,  makes  me 
very  happy."  He  slipped  his  large  glasses  off  and 
wiped  them  openly  without  attempting  to  hide  the 
fact  that  they  had  become  suddenly  useless  to 
him. 

A  short  silence  followed  —  a  silence  in  which  the 
emotion  with  which  the  room  was  charged  could  al- 
most be  heard.  Peter  threw  a  quick  glance  round  it, 
almost  as  though  he  expected  to  see  the  curious  ex- 
perimental tubes  turn  and  point  accusingly  at  his 
brother.  The  laboratory  was  filled  with  such  tubes 
and  other  curious  instruments, —  all  of  them  silent  wit- 
nesses of  Graham's  act  of  madness. 

The  Doctor  re-lit  his  cigar,  put  his  glasses  on  again 
and  clasped  his  long,  capable  hands  over  one  thin  knee. 
"  I  wish  I  could  even  suggest  to  you,"  he  said  —  more 
naturally  and  with  keen  enthusiasm  — "  the  intense  ex- 
citement that  we  bacteriologists  are  all  beginning  to 
feel.  For  years  and  years  we've  been  experimenting, 
and  little  by  little  our  work  is  coming  to  a  definite 
head.  Every  time  we  meet  we  find  that  we've  moved 
a  step  further  on  the  road  to  discoveries.  It  makes 
me  laugh  to  think  that  my  early  theories,  which,  only 
a  few  years  ago,  were  scoffed  at  and  looked  upon  as 
dreams,  are  taking  shape.  It's  been  a  long,  uphill 
fight.  Science  is  beginning  to  win.  It's  all  very  won- 
derful." He  noticed  that  Graham's  cigar  had  gone 
out.  With  extreme  politeness,  such  as  a  man  would 


LIFE  257 

use  to  very  welcome  guests,  he  held  out  a  box  of 
matches. 

The  boy  took  it.  "  I  don't  feel  like  smoking,"  he 
said,  with  a  catch  in  his  voice. 

Something  in  his  tone  made  the  Doctor  peer  closely 
at  him.  "  You  look  pale,  my  dear  lad,"  ke  said,  "  pale 
and  tired.  Aren't  you  well  ?  " 

"  Oh,  yes ;  he's  perfectly  all  right,"  said  Peter  hur- 
riedly, trying  to  steer  his  father  to  another  subject. 

Graham  threw  his  cigar  away.  "  I'm  not ! "  he 
cried,  with  a  sudden,  uncontrollable  outburst.  "  I  feel 
as  rotten  as  I  am.  I  can't  sit  here  and  listen  to  you, 
father.  Don't  be  kind  to  me,  I  can't  stand  it."  He 
put  his  head  down  between  his  hands  and  burst  out 
crying  like  a  boy. 

The  Doctor  was  startled.  He  got  up  quickly  and 
stood  hesitatingly.  He  wanted  to  put  his  hands  on 
the  boy's  shoulders,  but  the  sudden  breakdown  brought 
back  his  shyness.  "What's  the  matter?"  he  asked. 
"  Peter,  do  you  know  ?  " 

Peter  nodded.  He  then  made  up  his  mind  to  let 
things  take  their  course.  "  Let  him  tell  you,"  he  said. 
"  This  may  be  the  turning  point  for  all  three  of  us." 

Graham  drew  the  cheque-book  out  of  his  pocket, 
opened  it  and  threw  it  on  the  desk  under  the  reading 
lamp.  "  Look !  "  he  said.  <l  That's  what  I've  come 
to." 

For  some  moments  the  Doctor  saw  nothing  but  a 
cheque  drawn  by  himself  in  favor  of  his  second  son 
for  three  thousand  dollars.  The  fact  that  he  didn't  re- 
member having  made  it  out,  and  the  fact  that  it  was 


258        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

for  so  large  a  sum  made  at  first  no  impression  upon 
him.  He  was  so  puzzled  and  so  taken  back  at  the 
sudden  outburst  of  emotion  which  had  broken  up  what 
he  hoped  was  going  to  be  a  charming  reunion  that  the 
sight  of  this  cheque  conveyed  nothing  to  him.  Both 
his  sons  watched  him  closely,  not  knowing  what  he 
would  say  or  do.  He  was  such  a  stranger  to  them  — 
his  feelings  and  characteristics  were  so  unknown  to 
them  that  they  found  themselves  speculating  as  to  the 
manner  in  which  he  would  take  this  dreadful  piece  of 
dishonesty.  A  great  surprise  was  in  store  for  them. 

When  the  Doctor  realized  what  had  been  done, — 
that  the  signature  on  the  cheque  was  not  his  own,  al- 
though it  was  very  cleverly  copied, —  they  saw  him 
wince  and  shut  his  eyes.  After  a  moment  of  peculiar 
hesitation  he  drew  his  chair  up  to  the  desk  and  sat 
down.  Holding  his  breath,  Peter  watched  him  tear 
the  cheque  out  and  quietly  make  out  another  for  pre- 
cisely the  same  amount.  Then  the  Doctor  got  up  and 
stood  in  front  of  Graham  with  the  new  cheque  in  his 
hand.  All  the  sprightliness  and  exhilaration  with 
which  he  had  entered  the  room  had  left  him.  He 
looked  old  and  thin  and  humble.  His  shoulders 
stooped  a  little  and  the  cheque  trembled  in  his  hand. 

"  Am  I  such  an  ogre  that  my  children  are  afraid  to 
bring  their  troubles  to  me  ?  "  he  said,  in  a  broken  voice. 
"  What  have  I  ever  done  to  deserve  this,  Graham  ? 
You'd  only  to  come  to  me  and  say  that  you  needed 
money  and  I'd  have  given  it  to  you.  Who  am  I  work- 
ing for  ?  For  whom  have  I  always  worked  ?  "  He 
held  out  the  cheque.  "  Take  it,  and  if  that  isn't 


LIFE  259 

enough  ask  me  for  more.  I'd  like  to  know  why  it  is 
that  you  need  it,  if  you'll  be  good  enough  to  tell  me; 
but,  for  God's  sake,  don't  hurt  me  like  this  again." 

Without  a  word  —  without,  indeed,  being  able  to 
find  a  word, —  infinitely  more  crushed  by  this  kindness 
than  he  would  have  been  by  an  outburst  of  anger  and 
reproach, —  Graham  took  the  cheque,  turned  on  his 
heel  and  left  the  room,  walking  like  a  drunken  matt. 

Peter  watched  him  go.  There  was  a  feeling  of 
great  relief  in  his  heart.  Nothing  that  he  could  have 
done  or  said  —  nothing  that  Kenyon  could  have  said 
in  his  most  forcible  manner,  with  all  the  weight  of 
sophistication  behind  it,  could  have  pulled  Graham  up 
and  set  him  on  a  new  path  so  well  as  the  unexpected 
generosity  of  his  father  and  the  few  pathetic  words 
with  which  he  underlined  it. 

But  when  Peter  turned  round  to  his  father  with  the 
intention  of  taking  him,  for  the  first  time,  into  his  con- 
fidence and  treating  him  as  he  would  have  treated 
Ranken  Townsend  under  the  same  circumstances,  he 
saw  that  the  Doctor  was  crumpled  up  in  his  chair  with 
his  hands  over  his  face  and  his  shoulders  shaking  with 
sobs,  and  so  he  held  his  peace;  and  instead  of  obtain- 
ing the  help  that  he  needed  so  much  he  put  his  strong 
arm  round  his  father  in  a  strange  protective  way,  as 
though  he  were  the  stronger  man. 

"  Oh,  don't,  father,"  he  said.     "  Please  don't" 


260        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 


VII 

THERE  was  a  good  reason  why  Kenyon  didn't  stay 
out  his  fortnight  at  Dr.  Guthrie's  house.  He  had  al- 
ready begun  to  know  several  young  men  whose  very 
good  feathers  were  waiting  to  be  plucked.  It  was 
obviously  impossible  for  him  to  invite  them  to  East 
Fifty-second  Street,  and  it  became  necessary,  there- 
fore, that  he  should  take  a  bachelor-apartment  in 
which  to  set  up  business.  There  he  could  play  cards 
until  any  hour  that  suited  him  and  settle  down  seri- 
ously to  make  his  winter  in  New  York  a  success. 
Also,  he  confessed  to  himself,  the  atmosphere  of  the 
Doctor's  house  was  not  conducive  to  his  peace  of  mind 
or  to  his  rigidly  selfish  way  of  life.  He  hadn't  come 
over  to  the  United  States  in  order  to  play  the  fairy 
godmother,  or  even  the  family  adviser  to  the  young 
Guthries.  He  had  worked  hard  to  clear  the  one  thing 
out  of  Graham's  life  which  had  rendered  him  useless, 
and  he  had  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  Peter's  en- 
gagement broken,  for  which  admirable  accident  he 
was  profoundly  grateful,  because  Peter  also  would 
now  be  free.  In  fact,  these  two  brothers  could  now 
easily  be  brought  to  concentrate  upon  Kenyon's  de- 
serving case  and  take  round  to  his  apartment  any 
friends  of  theirs  who  enjoyed  gambling  and  could  pay 
when  they  lost. 

Kenyon  possessed  a  neat  and  tidy  brain.  It  was 
run  on  the  same  principle  as  a  well-organized  business 
office.  It  had  its  metaphorical  card  indexes,  letter- 


LIFE  261 

files  and  such  like;  so  that  when  he  made  up  his  mind 
to  go  into  his  own  quarters  he  gave  the  matter  the 
closest  and  most  careful  consideration.  He  paid  sev- 
eral visits  to  the  well-known  bachelor  apartment- 
houses  in  and  around  West  Forty-fourth  Street. 
They  would  have  been  very  suitable  but  for  the  exist- 
ence of  irksome  rules  and  regulations  as  to  ladies.  He 
went  further  afield  and,  with  Graham's  assistance,  ex- 
amined several  apartments  in  private  houses.  What 
he  wanted  was  a  place  somewhere  on  the  map  where 
his  breakfast  would  be  cooked  especially  for  him  at 
any  hour  he  desired,  and  which  would  be  free  of  ele- 
vator boys,  clerks,  and  the  watchful  eye  of  a  manager. 
Finally  he  discovered  exactly  such  a  place  on  the  sec- 
ond floor  of  a  fairly  large  old-fashioned  house  in  West 
Forty-eighth  Street.  In  this  the  elderly  lady  who,  as 
Kenyon  at  once  saw,  was  blessed  with  the  faculty  of 
being  able  to  look  at  things  with  a  Nelsonian  eye, — 
having,  poor  soul,  to  earn  her  living, —  lived  in  the 
basement  with  her  parrot  and  her  Manx  cat.  Two 
young  business  men  shared  rooms  on  the  first  floor 
and  a  retired  professor  —  who  spent  the  greater  part 
of  his  time  in  the  country  —  rented  the  third  floor. 
The  servants  slept  in  the  attic. 

Into  this  house  Kenyon  moved, —  much  against  the 
wishes  of  all  the  Guthries,  especially  Belle, —  the  day 
after  Peter's  attempt  to  get  in  touch  with  his  father 
came  to  such  an  utter  failure.  He  was  very  well 
pleased  with  his  quarters.  They  gave  him  elbow-room 
and  freedom  from  the  responsibility  of  looking  after 
another  man's  sons.  The  sitting-room,  arched  in  the 


262        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

middle,  ran  from  the  front  to  the  back  of  the  house 
and  it  was  well  and  discreetly  furnished.  There  was 
a  particularly  nice  old  Colonial  mirror  over  the  man- 
tel-piece, and  what  prints  there  were  hanging  on  the 
walls  were  very  pleasant.  The  bedroom  across  the 
passage  would  have  been  equally  large  had  it  not  been 
broken  up  to  provide  a  bath-room  and  a  slip-room  for 


Fate,  however,  with  its  characteristic  impishness, 
interfered  with  Kenyon's  well-laid  scheme.  At  the 
very  hour  when  he  was  arranging  his  personal  photo- 
graphs a  cable  addressed  to  him  was  delivered  at  Dr. 
Guthrie's  house.  It  so  happened  that  Peter  was  in  the 
hall  when  the  servant  took  it  in,  and  he  started  off  at 
once  to  take  it  round  to  his  friend.  He  was  glad 
enough  to  seize  any  excuse  to  see  Kenyon  again.  He 
felt  horribly  at  a  loose  end.  Graham's  affairs  had 
completely  upset  him  and  disarranged  his  plans.  He 
was  longing  to  see  Betty,  but  was  not  going  back  on 
his  agreement  with  Ranken  Townsend  until  such  time 
as  he  could  make  the  artist  eat  his  words;  and,  as  to 
his  father  and  his  endeavor  to  break  down  that  appar- 
ently insurmountable  barrier,  he  was  utterly  disheart- 
ened and  depressed.  He  was  shown  into  Kenyon's 
rooms  at  the  moment  when  he  was  standing  in  front 
of  a  very  charming  photograph  of  Baby  Lennox  which 
he  had  placed  on  the  sideboard.  It  showed  her  in  a 
little  simple  frock,  with  a  wide-brimmed  garden  hat, 
standing  among  her  roses  with  a  smile  on  her  face. 
She  looked  very  young,  pretty  and  flower-like. 

"Hello,  Peter  1" 


LIFE  263 

"  I've  brought  this  cable  round.  Otherwise  I 
wouldn't  have  rushed  in  on  you  quite  so  soon." 

"  My  dear  old  boy,"  said  Kenyon,  "  you  know  very 
well  that  you  have  the  complete  run  of  whatever  place 
I  may  be  living  in,  at  all  hours  of  the  day  and  night. 
A  cable  for  me,  eh?  What  the  devil  — ?  I  was  jolly 
careful  to  give  my  address  here  to  very  few  people  in 
England.  Too  many  are  anxious  to  serve  me  with 
summonses.  Baby  Lennox  is  going  to  be  married, 
perhaps,  and  sends  me  the  glad  tidings.  By  Jove,  I 
wonder  who  she's  nabbed !  "  He  shot  out  a  laugh  and 
tore  open  the  envelope.  "  Oh,  my  God !  " 

"  What  ifc  it  ?  "  asked  Peter,  anxiously. 

Kenyon  held  out  the  cablegram  and  remained  stand- 
ing rigid,  with  his  mouth  open  and  his  eyes  shut,  and 
his  face  as  white  as  a  stone. 

It  was  from  Baby  Lennox.  "  Your  father  died  last 
night.  A  heart  attack.  Come  home  at  once." 

"  Oh,  my  dear  Nick !  "  said  Peter.  "  My  dear  old 
boy !  I  can't  tell  you  how " 

"  No,"  said  Kenyon ;  "  don't  say  anything.  Just  sit 
down  and  wait  for  me.  Whatever  you  do,  don't  go." 
And  he  went  out  of  the  room  and  across  the  passage 
to  his  bedroom,  and  shut  himself  in. 

Peter  waited.  The  few  cold,  definite  and  even 
brutal  words  contained  in  the  cablegram  would  have 
hit  him  much  harder  and  rendered  his  sympathy  for 
his  friend  very  much  more  real  if  he  could  have  felt 
what  it  would  have  been  to  him  to  hear  of  the  death 
of  his  own  father.  While  he  waited,  mechanically 
holding  that  slip  of  paper  between  his  fingers,  his  re- 


264        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

spect  for  his  friend's  grief  widened  into  an  odd  and 
powerful  feeling  of  envy.  The  man  who  was  dead 
had  been  infinitely  more  than  a  father.  He  had  been 
a  friend  and  a  brother  as  well.  It  made  him  sick  and 
cold  to  feel  that  the  receipt  of  such  a  cablegram  bring- 
ing to  him  the  news  of  the  death  of  his  own  father 
would  have  moved  him  only  to  extreme  sympathy  for 
his  mother.  He  was  ashamed  and  humiliated  to  real- 
ize that  no  actual  grief  would  touch  him,  because  his 
father  was  nothing  more  than  a  sort  of  kind  but  illusive 
guardian  or  a  good-natured  step-father  —  altogether 
unused  to  children  —  who  effaced  himself  as  much  as 
he  could  and  threw  all  responsibility  upon  his  wife. 

It  was  an  hour  before  Kenyon  reappeared,  and  dur- 
ing that  time  —  which  seemed  to  Peter  no  more  than 
a  few  minutes  —  he  went  over  again  in  his  mind  the 
scene  which  had  taken  place  in  the  Doctor's  laboratory, 
out  of  which  he  had  gone  stultified  and  thrown  back 
upon  himself.  He  was  as  grateful  as  Graham  had 
been  for  the  Doctor's  generosity,  but  appalled  at  the 
thought  that  he  had  utterly  failed  to  realize  not  only 
the  gravity  of  Graham's  act,  but  the  long  years  of 
parental  neglect  which  made  such  an  act  possible.  It 
seemed  to  him  that  the  way  in  which  his  father  had 
taken  that  deplorable  incident  was  all  wrong.  He 
should  not  have  written  another  cheque.  He  should 
have  had  Graham  up  in  front  of  him,  strongly  and 
firmly,  and  tried  him  as  a  judge  would  have  tried  him 
if  his  act  had  been  discovered  and  dealt  with  by  law. 
He  should  have  gone  into  all  the  circumstances  which 
led  up  to  the  forgery  and  thereby  have  cleared  the  way 


LIFE  265 

for  a  new  understanding.  As  it  was,  his  acceptance 
of  it  was  so  weak  that  it  gave  Peter  and  Graham  a 
feeling  almost  of  contempt  for  that  too  kind  man  to 
whom  children  were  obviously  without  significance, 
and  the  unmistakable  knowledge  that  he  was  unable  to 
understand  his  grave  responsibility  and  the  fact  that 
he,  alone  among  men,  must  take  the  blame  for  all  their 
misdeeds  and  mistakes,  because  they  had  been  allowed 
to  enter  life  unwarned,  unguided  and  unhelped.  The 
outcome  to  Peter  of  this  hour's  bitter  thought  was 
finally  this :  That  if  news  were  brought  to  him  at  that 
moment  of  his  father's  death  the  only  sorrow  that  he 
could  feel  would  be  at  the  fact  that  he  felt  no  sorrow. 

When  Kenyon  came  back  into  the  room  it  was  with 
his  usual  imperturbability.  He  might  merely  have 
left  it  to  answer  the  telephone  or  interview  the  man 
who  had  come  to  collect  his  clothes  to  be  ironed.  But 
his  eyes  were  red.  In  his  own  peculiar  way  he  had 
loved  his  father  and  admired  him.  It  was  the  first 
time  that  he  had  wept  since  he  had  been  a  child. 

"  Thanks,  so  much,  for  waiting,  old  boy,"  he  said. 
"  I  hope  you've  been  smoking,  or  something." 

"  No,"  said  Peter ;  "  I  have  things  to  think  about 
too." 

Kenyon  looked  about,  with  a  queer  little  smile.  "  I 
was  just  settling  down,"  he  said.  "  Very  decent  room, 
this,  isn't  it  ?  Well,  well,  there  it  is.  You  never  know 
your  luck,  eh?  " 

"  When  will  you  sail,  Nick?  " 

"  The  first  possible  boat.  Do  you  know  anything 
about  the  sailings?  Ah,  this  paper  will  have  it.  I 


266        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

detest  the  sea  and  its  everlasting  monotony  and  bland- 
ness,  and  the  dull-bright  propinquity  that  it  forces 
upon  one."  He  opened  the  paper  and  searched  among 
its  endless  columns  for  the  Shipping  News.  "  Here 
we  are.  *  Trans-Atlantic  Sailings.'  I  have  a  wide 
choice,  I  see.  There's  a  White  Star  and  a  Cunarder 
leaving  to-morrow  at  twelve-thirty.  The  Olympic,  I 
see!  That's  good  enough, —  if  she's  not  full  up.  I'll 
see  to  it  this  afternoon.  There's  sure  to  be  a  cabin 
somewhere  at  this  time  of  year." 

"  I  shall  miss  you  badly,"  said  Peter. 

"  Thanks,  old  man.  I  know  you  will.  And  I  shall 
hate  going.  Well,  well !  " 

Peter  picked  up  a  book  and  put  it  down  again; 
opened  and  shut  a  box  of  cigarettes  and  pushed  a  bowl 
of  flowers  nearer  the  middle  of  the  table.  "  Do  you 
want  any  —  I  mean,  can  I ?  " 

Kenyon  laid  his  hand  on  his  friend's  square  shoul- 
der. "  Not  this  time,  Peter,  old  son.  Thanks,  aw- 
fully. I've  had  one  or  two  good  nights  and  my  pock- 
ets are  full  of  dollars.  They'll  see  me  home  with  per- 
fect comfort.  Well,  here  ends  my  visit  to  the  United 
States.  To-morrow  night  I  shall  have  left  the  hos- 
pitable Statue  of  Liberty  behind  me.  But  she'll  see 
me  again.  I'll  dash  round  in  the  morning  and  thank 
your  people  for  their  extreme  kindness  to  me.  You'll 
see  me  off,  won't  you?  " 

"  Yes,"  said  Peter ;  "  of  course." 

"Of  course.  We  won't  dine  to-night.  I  —  I  don't 
feel  like  it." 

"  I  understand,  old  man,"  said  Peter. 


LIFE  267 

"  So  long,  then." 

"  So  long,"  said  Peter. 

"  The  Earl  is  dead ! "  said  Kenyon,  with  a  sudden 
break  in  his  voice.  "  Long  live  the  Earl !  "  And  he 
raised  his  hand  above  his  head. 

VIII 

NOT  for  the  first  time  in  his  comparatively  short 
life,  Nicholas  Kenyon  was  able  to  put  to  the  test  his 
often  boasted  power  of  self-control.  It  was  his  creed 
to  accept  everything  that  might  happen  to  him,  whether 
good  or  bad,  with  equanimity.  It  was  part  of  his 
training  to  allow  nothing  to  interfere  with  the  routine 
of  his  day  and  the  particular  scheme  that  he  had 
worked  out  for  himself.  He  was,  however,  utterly 
unprepared  for  his  father's  death.  Only  the  day  be- 
fore he  had  received  a  very  cheerful  and  amusing  let- 
ter from  the  Earl  of  Shropshire  which  had  provided 
him  with  many  quiet  chuckles.  When  the  blow  came 
in  that  sudden  fashion  it  knocked  him  down  and  for 
an  hour  reduced  him  to  the  level  of  an  ordinary  human 
being  —  of  a  man  who  had  not  specialized  in  individ- 
ualism and  who  did  not  set  the  earth  revolving  round 
himself  as  its  hub.  Shut  up  in  his  bedroom  he  gave 
way  to  his  real  and  best  emotions,  the  genuineness  of 
which  surprised  him.  He  was  a  master  egotist  —  a 
superindividualist  —  the  very  acme  of  selfishness. 
Therefore,  odd  as  it  may  seem,  he  was  somewhat 
ashamed  of  his  deep  feeling,  because  it  proved  to  him 
that  one  of  the  links  of  his  carefully  forged  chain  of 


268        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

philosophy  was  weak.  He  defined  the  word  philoso- 
pher as  one  who  is  profoundly  versed  in  the  science  of 
looking  after  himself. 

As  soon  as  Peter  had  left  Kenyon's  rooms,  the  new 
Earl  of  Shropshire  took  himself  in  hand  and  "  carried 
on  "  as  they  do  in  the  Navy  after  casualties,  accidents 
and  the  issue  of  new  orders.  He  continued  to  ar- 
range his  photographs  round  the  room.  He  consid- 
ered that  he  might  as  well  make  himself  completely 
comfortable  until  the  time  came  for  him  to  pack  up 
again  and  leave  the  country.  He  called  up  Belle  on  the 
telephone  and  had  a  little  talk  with  her.  He  told  her 
of  his  father's  death  and  of  the  fact  that  he  would  have 
to  sail  within  the  next  twenty- four  hours.  He  lis- 
tened with  satisfaction  to  her  cry  of  anguish,  and  ar- 
ranged with  her  to  come  to  see  him  that  evening.  It 
appeared  that  she  was  engaged  to  dine  with  some 
friends  and  go  with  them  to  hear  Alfred  Noyes  read 
his  poems  at  the  ^olian  Hall.  He  insisted  upon  her 
keeping  her  engagement  and  begged  that  she  would 
come  round  to  his  rooms  alone  at  eleven  o'clock. 

He  didn't  intend  to  leave  the  United  States,  even 
under  such  circumstances,  without  adding  Belle  to  his 
little  list  of  conquests.  The  cold-bloodedness  of  such 
an  intention  was  peculiarly  characteristic  of  the  man. 
"  No  weakness,"  he  said  to  himself  — "  no  weakness. 
No  matter  what  happens,  what  had  happened,  is  hap- 
pening or  may  happen,  you  must  carry  on.  You've 
built  up  a  creed,  stick  to  it."  And  then,  very  quietly  - — 
having  changed  his  tie  to  a  black  one  —  he  went  forth 
to  discover  the  offices  of  the  White  Star  Steamship 


LIFE  269 

Company, —  having  obtained  the  proper  directions 
from  his  landlady.  He  took  the  subway  to  the  Bat- 
tery, interviewed  a  clerk  of  Number  One  Broadway, 
had  the  good  fortune  to  find  that  there  was  a  state- 
room vacant  on  the  boat  deck  of  the  Olympic; 
wrote  his  cheque  for  it;  pocketed  a  bundle  of  labels; 
paid  Graham  a  brief  visit  in  his  office  on  Wall  Street 
and  walked  all  the  way  home  again,  endeavoring  to 
count  the  German  names  all  along  the  most  amazing 
street  in  the  world,  and  giving  up  his  temporary  hobby 
in  despair.  On  the  way  home  he  sent  off  a  cable  to 
Baby  Lennox,  giving  her  the  name  of  the  ship  on 
which  he  was  to  sail.  By  this  time  he  was  tired  and  a 
little  dazed  at  the  amazing  stir  and  bustle  of  Broad- 
way, with  its  never-ceasing  lines  of  cable-cars  and  its 
whir  and  rush  of  human  traffic.  He  was  glad  of  a 
cup  of  tea,  and  presently  arranged  himself  for  a  quiet 
nap  on  the  sofa  in  his  sitting-room. 

Later,  with  his  mind  concentrated  solely  on  Belle's 
impending  visit  and  what  he  intended  to  achieve,  he 
dined  alone  at  the  Ritz,  dropped  in  to  see  a  turn  or 
two  at  the  Palace,  and  strolled  back  to  Forty-eighth 
Street  at  half-past-ten.  As  he  went  into  the  house 
he  heard  the  landlady  talking  to  the  two  young  busi- 
ness men  who  lived  on  the  first  floor.  She  was  asking 
them  to  be  good  enough  not  to  play  the  piano  that 
evening,  as  the  Professor  had  come  back  from  the 
country  and  was  very  unwell.  She  had  sent  for  the 
doctor,  and  he  would  be  more  comfortable  if  the  house 
were  as  silent  as  it  could  be  made. 

Knowing  that  Belle  would  be  punctual  that  night, 


270        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

of  all  nights,  he  went  down  just  before  eleven  o'clock 
and  waited  for  her  at  the  front  door.  It  was  his  in- 
tention to  get  her  into  the  house  unobserved,  more  for 
his  own  sake  than  for  hers.  The  night  was  clear,  but 
half  a  gale  was  blowing,  carrying  before  it  all  the  dust 
of  the  city  and  sending  odd  pieces  of  paper  swirling 
into  the  air  and  making  the  hanging  signs  outside 
shops  and  small  restaurants  creak  and  groan.  In  its 
strong,  vibrating  song  there  was  a  note  of  wild  passion 
that  fitted  exquisitely  into  Kenyon's  frame  of  mind. 

Belle  drove  up  in  a  taxicab  a  few  minutes  after 
eleven.  "  Not  a  word  until  we  get  upstairs,"  said 
Kenyon,  as  he  helped  her  out.  And  then  when  she 
stood  in  his  sitting-room,  with  all  her  emotions  in  a 
state  of  upheaval,  nothing  was  said  for  many  minutes. 
He  took  her  in  his  arms  and  kissed  her,  delighting  in 
her  young  beauty  and  freshness  with  all  the  apprecia- 
tion of  a  connoisseur. 

There  seemed  to  Belle  to  be  no  indiscretion  in  this 
visit.  Was  she  not  engaged  to  be  married  to  this  man  ? 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  she  was  not.  Kenyon  had  been 
playing  with  her ;  and  now  that  he  had  succeeded  to  his 
father's  title  he  had  even  less  intention  of  dealing  seri- 
ously by  her  than  ever  before.  Marriage  was  not  in 
his  thoughts  or  plans.  The  title  was  his  and  the  old 
house  that  went  with  it,  but  he  was  no  better  off  than 
he  had  been  as  Nicholas  Kenyon,  the  Oxford  under- 
graduate. On  the  contrary  he  now  had  responsibilities 
of  which  he  had  hitherto  been  free  and  he  must  look 
out  for  some  one  who  could  buy  his  name  for  a  sub- 
stantial sum.  If  Belle  had  read  into  his  vague  and 


LIFE  271 

indefinite  remarks  a  proposal  of  marriage  it  only 
showed  that  she  possessed  a  very  lively  imagination. 
He  was  not  going  at  that  point  to  undeceive  her.  He 
was  merely  going  to  take  from  her  everything  that  she 
was  gracious  enough  to  give.  His  trip  to  New  York 
had  provided  him  with  very  little  in  actual  substance. 
He  was  determined  that  it  should  not  be  altogether 
empty,  and  that  Belle  should  furnish  him  with  a  charm- 
ing memento. 

He  broke  into  Belle's  preliminary  remarks  of  con- 
ventional condolence  by  saying,  "  Thank  you ;  but 
please  don't  say  a  word  about  my  father.  Let's  talk 
about  ourselves.  We're  alive.  The  next  few  hours 
are  our  property.  Let's  make  them  memorable.  Let's 
give  each  other  something  that  we  can  never  forget." 
And  he  took  her  cloak  and  led  her  to  a  chair  as  though 
she  were  a  queen,  and  stood  looking  at  her  with  very 
greedy  eyes. 

But  Belle's  temperament  was  Latin.  Ever  since 
Kenyon  had  spoken  to  her  over  the  telephone  she  had 
been  unable  to  control  her  feelings.  She  loved  this 
man  overwhelmingly.  She  had  given  him  all  her 
heart,  which  had  never  been  touched  before.  To  her 
it  seemed  amazingly  cruel  that  fate  had  come  along 
with  its  usual  lack  of  sympathy  and  circumspection 
and  put  a  sudden  end  to  all  the  delightful  hours  to 
which  she  had  been  looking  forward.  The  death  of  a 
man  whom  she  didn't  know  meant  very  little  to  her. 
She  was  young,  and  to  the  young  what  is  death  but  ?. 
vague  mystery,  an  inconvenient  accident  which  seems 
to  affect  every  one  but  themselves  ?  Indeed,  she  rather 


272        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

resented  the  fact  that  Kenyon's  father,  in  dying,  was 
to  take  so  suddenly  out  of  her  life  the  one  human  being 
about  whom  her  entire  happiness  revolved. 

"Oh,  Nicholas,  Nicholas!  Must  you  go?  Must 
you  leave  me  ?  Let  me  go  with  you.  I  have  the  right. 
I  shall  be  miserable  and  unhappy  without  you."  And 
she  clung  to  him  with  all  the  unreasonableness  of  a 
child. 

Kenyon  was  not  in  the  least  touched  by  this  appeal 
—  only  extremely  pleased,  because  it  showed  him  that 
Belle  was  in  the  right  mood  to  be  won.  He  put  his 
hand  on  her  round,  white  shoulder.  "  You  must  be 
brave,"  he  said.  "  I  know  how  you  feel,  but  you  must 
help  me.  Don't  make  things  more  difficult  than  they 
are.  I  may  be  able  to  come  back  quite  soon, —  who 
can  tell?" 

"  I  believe  you're  glad  to  go !  "  cried  Belle. 

Kenyon  drew  back.  He  wanted  to  make  her  feel 
that  she  had  hurt  him.  He  succeeded. 

In  an  instant,  full  of  self-reproach,  Belle  was  on  her 
feet  and  in  his  arms  again.  "  What  am  I  going  to  do 
without  you?  I  almost  wish  you'd  never  come  into 
my  life.  I've  been  looking  forward  to  your  being 
here  the  whole  winter.  How  am  I  going  to  get 
through  the  days  alone  ?  " 

A  motor-car  drew  up  at  the  house.  Neither  of  them 
heard  Dr.  Guthrie's  voice  giving  a  quick  order  to  the 
chauffeur  or  recognized  his  step  as  he  passed  upstairs 
on  the  way  to  see  his  friend,  the  Professor,  on  the 
floor  above,  to  whom  he  had  been  called  by  the  land- 
lady. 


LIFE  273 

Presently,  having  turned  out  all  the  lights  except  a 
shaded  lamp  on  the  table,  Kenyon  began  to  let  himself 
go.  He  threw  aside  his  characteristic  calmness  and 
became  the  lover  —  the  passionate,  adoring  man  who 
was  about  to  be  separated,  under  tragic  circumstances, 
from  the  girl  who  was  equally  in  love.  He  threw 
aside  his  first  intention  of  finessing  Belle  into  his  bed- 
room on  the  plea  of  asking  her  to  help  him  to  pack. 
He  remembered  that  the  old  man  above  was  ill  and  that 
the  landlady  and  others  would  be  passing  to  and  fro. 
This  was  distinctly  annoying.  He  was,  however,  a 
past-master  in  the  art  that  he  was  at  present  pursuing 
and  set  the  whole  of  his  mind  on  his  opportunity. 
Belle  was,  naturally  enough,  as  putty  in  his  hands  and 
her  despair  at  losing  him  made  her  weak  and  pliable. 

He  sat  down  on  the  sofa  and  held  Belle  in  his  arms 
and  kissed  her  again  and  again.  "  I  love  you !  I  love 
you !  I  don't  know  —  I  can't  think  what  I  shall  be 
like  without  you,"  he  said,  bringing  all  his  elaborate 
cunning  to  play  upon  her  feelings.  "  More  like  a 
man  who's  lost  his  arms  than  anything;  and  we  were 
to  have  come  nearer  and  nearer  this  winter,  finding 
out  all  the  best  of  each  other  and  all  the  joy  that  it  is 
to  love  wholly  and  completely." 

"  Oh,  don't  go,  don't  go ! "  cried  Belle,  making  a 
pathetic  and  almost  child-like  refrain  of  the  words,  "  I 
love  you  so !  I  love  you  so !  " 

Kenyon  bent  down  with  her  until  her  head  was  pil- 
lowed on  the  cushions,  and  kissed  her  lips  and  eyes. 
"  You  must  love  me,  sweetheart,  you  must.  It's  the 
only  thing  that  I  can  turn  to  and  count  on  now.  Go  on 


274        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

loving  me  every  minute  that  I'm  away.  I  shall  need 
it, —  and  before  I  go  let  me  have  the  precious  proof  of 
your  love  to  store  up  in  my  heart.  Give  me  the  price- 
less gift  that  is  the  only  thing  to  keep  me  living  till  I 
come  back." 

"Nicholas,  Nicholas!"  she  whispered,  with  her 
young  breasts  heaving  against  him.  "  I  love  you  so ! 
I  love  you  so !  " 

The  moment  of  his  triumph  had  almost  been  reached 
when  the  Doctor,  on  his  way  down,  saw  something 
glistening  in  the  passage  outside  Kenyon's  sitting- 
room.  He  stooped  and  picked  it  up.  He  was  puzzled 
to  see  that  it  was  a  little  brooch  that  he  had  given 
to  Belle  on  one  of  her  birthdays.  Her  initials  had 
been  worked  on  it  in  diamonds.  For  several  mo- 
ments he  held  it  in  his  hand,  wondering  how  it  could 
have  been  dropped  in  that  place.  He  was  utterly 
unaware  of  the  fact  that  Kenyon  lived  in  the  house 
which  he  knew  to  be  given  up  to  bachelors.  Then 
the  blood  rushed  into  his  head.  Almost  for  the  first 
time  in  his  life  the  Doctor  acted  on  the  spur  of 
the  moment.  He  was  filled  with  a  sudden  sense  of 
fear  before  which  his  inherent  shyness  and  hesitancy 
were  swept  completely  away.  He  tried  to  open  the 
door.  It  was  locked.  He  hammered  upon  it,  shout- 
ing :  "  Let  me  in !  Let  me  in !  " 

Kenyon,  cursing  inwardly,  sprang  up  from  the  sofa. 
"  It's  your  father,"  he  said.  "  Go  and  sit  by  the  table, 
quick,  and  pretend  to  be  arranging  these  photographs." 
He  could  have  ignored  that  knocking,  but  the  result 
would  be  that  the  Doctor  would  go  down  to  the  land- 


LIFE  275 

lady  and  there  would  be  a  scandal.  How  in  the  name 
of  thunder  did  he  know  that  Belle  was  in  the  room? 
He  dashed  over  to  the  mantel-piece,  collected  a  hand- 
ful of  his  pictures  and  threw  them  on  the  table  in 
front  of  Belle,  who,  with  a  touch  of  panic,  tried  to 
smooth  her  hair.  Then  he  went  to  the  door  and 
opened  it. 

"  Good  evening,  Doctor,"  he  said  quietly.  "  This 
is  very  kind  of  you.  Belle  is  here  helping  me  to  pack, 
and  Peter  should  have  been  here,  but  I  expect  some- 
thing has  detained  him.  Do  come  in."  He  saw  the 
brooch  in  the  Doctor's  hand  and  cursed  Belle's  care- 
lessness. 

As  Dr.  Guthrie  entered  the  room  the  blood  slowly 
left  his  head.  A  feeling  of  intense  relief  pervaded 
him.  He  saw  Belle  sitting  at  the  table  with  the  ut- 
most composure  putting  one  photograph  on  top  of 
another.  At  his  side  stood  the  man  who  had  recently 
been  his  honored  guest  and  who  was  the  best  friend 
of  his  eldest  son, —  the  man  of  whose  sad  loss  he  had 
heard  that  afternoon  from  his  wife.  He  thanked  God 
that  everything  was  well  and  hastened  to  accept  Ken- 
yon's  suggestion  that  he  had  come  there  for  the  pur- 
pose of  saying  good-bye  to  him.  It  saved  him  from 
the  appearance  of  having  lost  his  head  and  made  a 
fool  of  himself.  "  I  —  I'm  indeed  grieved  to  hear  of 
your  father's  death,  my  dear  Mr.  Kenyon,"  he  said, 
stammering  a  little.  "  I  was  called  to  see  an  old  friend 
of  mine  who  lives  in  this  house,  who  isn't  at  all  well, 
and  I  thought  I'd  take  the  opportunity  on  my  way 
down " 


276        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  I'm  deeply  obliged  to  you,"  said  Kenyon,  giving 
the  weak,  nervous  man  before  him  the  credit  of  hav- 
ing seized  the  hint  so  quickly.  "  It  helps  me  very  much 
to  have  so  many  good  friends.  I  sail  to-morrow  at 
two-thirty.  This  is  a  good  opportunity  for  me  to 
thank  you  very  much  for  your  delightful  hospitality. 
Will  you  wait  for  Peter?  " 

"No;  I  think  not,  thanks,"  said  the  Doctor.  "  It's 
getting  late  and,  as  you  say,  Peter  has  in  all  prob- 
ability been  detained.  Belle,  dear,  I  think  you'd  bet- 
ter come  with  me,  now." 

Kenyon  was  still  quite  placid  and  courteous  and  un- 
daunted. "  Oh,  but  mayn't  she  stay  until  Peter  turns 
up?" 

"  I  think  not,"  replied  the  Doctor,  astonished  at  his 
own  firmness.  "  It's  very  late." 

"  Curse  it !  Curse  it ! "  cried  Kenyon,  inwardly. 
But  with  a  little  smile  he  went  over  to  Belle  and  gave 
her  his  hand.  "  You've  helped  me  a  lot,"  he  said.  "  I 
can  easily  finish  packing  now.  Good  night  and  good- 
bye." 

Choking  back  her  sobs  and  full  of  resentment  at 
her  father's  clumsiness  and  interference,  Belle  rose  and 
allowed  Kenyon  to  help  her  into  her  cloak. 

By  a  strange  accident  she,  like  Graham,  had  been 
saved  from  a  disaster  which  might  have  followed  her 
into  the  future.  God's  hand  must  have  been  stretched 
out  to  help  that  man,  who,  by  his  unconscious  neglect, 
had  made  it  possible  for  these  two  children  of  his  to 
stand  on  the  brink  of  irreparable  misfortune. 

Kenyon,  keeping  up  a  quiet  flow  of  conventional 


LIFE  277 

remarks,  followed  them  down-stairs  and  out  into  the 
street.  He  could  have  drawn  Belle  back  into  the  hall 
while  the  Doctor  went  out  to  the  car,  and  kissed  her 
once  again.  But, —  it  was  over,  what  was  the  use. 
He  watched  her  fling  herself  into  the  motor-car  and 
sit  all  hunched  up  with  her  hands  over  her  face,  and 
then  he  took  the  Doctor's  hand  and  shook  it  warmly. 
All  the  angels  in  Heaven  must  have  shuddered  as  he 
did  so,  and  cried,  "  Judas !  Judas !  " 

"  Good-bye  again,  then/'  said  the  Doctor.  "  I'm 
deeply  sorry  for  the  reason  that  takes  you  away  from 
us.  I  hope  we  may  see  you  again  soon." 

"  I  hope  so,  too,"  said  Kenyon. 

Standing  in  that  quiet  street  he  watched  the  auto- 
mobile drive  away,  and  cursed.  His  mind  was  filled 
with  impotent  rage.  He  felt  as  he  did  when  he  was  a 
child  and  some  one  had  hurt  him.  He  wanted  to  find 
the  thing  which  that  some  one  treasured  most  and 
break  it  all  to  pieces,  and  stamp  on  it.  Then  he  re- 
turned to  his  rooms,  switched  on  all  the  lights,  and  with 
a  gesture  almost  animalish  in  its  baffled  passion,  swept 
all  the  photographs  from  the  table. 

He  was  kicking  them  savagely,  one  after  another, 
when  he  heard  the  whistle  which  he  and  Peter  had 
used  at  Oxford  to  attract  each  other's  attention.  He 
ran  to  the  window  and  opened  it.  There  stood 
Peter  with  a  glint  of  moonlight  on  his  great  square 
shoulders. 

"  Come  up !  "  said  Kenyon.  "  By  God,  my  luck's 
come  back!  Now  I  can  make  that  old  fool  pay  for 
ruining  my  evening!  " 


278        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 


IX 

WITH  a  fiendish  scheme  in  the  back  of  his  head  and 
with  a  most  unpleasant  smile  on  his  face,  Kenyon  went 
over  to  the  sideboard.  He  brought  out  two  glasses. 
In  one  he  mixed  a  whiskey  high-ball  and  in  the  other 
he  poured  a  concoction  of  neat  whiskey  and  brandy, 
adding  everything  else  that  his  bottles  contained, —  a 
mixture  calculated  to  dull  the  senses  even  of  the  most 
hardened  drinker.  Then  he  waited  —  still  with  this 
unpleasant  smile  upon  his  face. 

When  Peter  came  in  he  looked  tired  and  pale.  His 
boots  were  covered  with  dust  and  there  were  beads  of 
perspiration  on  his  forehead.  "  I  saw  that  you  were 
up,"  he  said,  "  so  I  whistled.  If  you  hadn't  called  out 
I  should  have  gone  home.  Hope  you  don't  mind." 

"  Mind !  "  cried  Kenyon.  "  I  never  was  so  glad  to 
see  anybody  in  my  life.  You  look  like  a  tramp. 
Where've  you  been  ?  " 

Peter  threw  his  hat  on  the  sofa  and  sat  down  heavily. 
"  I  wasn't  in  the  mood  to  go  home  to  dinner.  I've 
been  walking  hard  ever  since  I  saw  you.  God  knows 
where  I've  been.  At  one  time  I  stood  under  the 
apartment-house  in  Gramercy  Park.  It's  a  wonder  I 
didn't  go  up  and  have  it  out  again  with  Ranken  Town- 
send.  But  it  wouldn't  have  been  any  use." 

"Not  the  smallest,"  said  Kenyon.  "You'd  only 
have  given  him  the  satisfaction  of  standing  on  his  hind- 
legs  and  preaching  to  you.  Will  you  have  something 
to  eat?" 


LIFE  279 

Peter  shook  his  head. 

"  Well,  then,  have  a  drink."  And  he  put  the  poison 
in  front  of  Peter.  "  I  was  going  to  drink  to  myself, 
—  a  rather  dull  proceeding  alone.  Now  you  can  join 
me.  On  your  feet,  Peter,  old  man,  and  with  no  heel- 
taps, I  give  you  '  the  new  Peer !  The  most  decorative 
member  of  England's  aristocracy, —  Nicholas  Augus- 
tus Fitzhugh  Kenyon,  Eighth  Earl  of  Shropshire, 
master  of  Thrapstone-Wynyates  —  the  man  without 
a  shilling ! '  Let  it  go !  " 

Peter  stood  up,  clinked  his  friend's  glass  with  his 
own,  emptied  it  and  set  it  down.  "  Good  Lord !  "  he 
said,  with  a  frightful  grimace.  "  What  in  thunder 
was  that?" 

Kenyon  burst  into  a  derisive  laugh.  " '  Some 
drink,'  as  you  say  over  here.  Away  goes  your  water- 
wagon,  Master  Peter.  Off  you  come  from  your  self 
made  pedestal.  Drunk  and  incapable  will  be  the  words 
that  will  presently  be  very  fitly  applied  to  you,  my  im- 
maculate friend."  And  he  laughed  again,  as  though 
it  were  a  great  joke.  It  would  do  him  good  to  see 
Peter  "  human,"  as  he  called  it,  for  once,  to  satisfy 
his  sense  of  revenge  —  to  pay  out  Dr.  Guthrie  for  his 
cursed  interference. 

Peter  was  glad  to  get  back  to  his  chair.  "  I  don't 
care  what  happens  to  me,"  he  said.  "  What  does  it 
matter  ?  I've  got  nothing  to  live  for  —  a  father  who 
doesn't  care  a  damn  what  becomes  of  me,  and  a  girl 
who's  given  me  up  without  a  struggle." 

He  had  had  nothing  to  eat  since  the  middle  of  the 
'day.  He  was  mentally  and  physically  weary.  Al- 


280        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

though  he  was  unaware  of  the  fact,  he  had  caught  a 
severe  chill.  It  was  not  surprising  that  the  horrible 
concoction  which  Kenyon  had  deliberately  mixed  went 
straight  to  his  head. 

Everything  vile  lying  at  the  bottom  of  Kenyon's 
nature  had  been  stirred  up.  At  that  moment  he  cared 
nothing  for  his  friend's  repeated  generosity,  his  con- 
sistent loyalty  and  his  golden  friendship.  With  a  sort 
of  diabolical  desire  to  amuse  himself  and  see  humiliated 
in  front  of  him  the  man  who  had  stuck  to  his  principles 
so  grimly,  he  filled  his  glass  again,  to  make  certainty 
doubly  certain.  "  This  time,"  he  cried,  "  I'll  give  you 
another  toast.  Come  on,  now.  On  your  feet  again, 
and  drink  to  '  that  most  charming  family,  the  Guthries, 
and  in  particular  to  the  eldest  son  —  to  the  dear,  good 
boy  who  has  run  straight  and  never  been  drunk,  and 
has  treated  women  with  such  noble  chivalry.  In  a 
word,  to  Peter,  the  virgin  man.' '  He  raised  his  glass, 
and  so  did  Peter.  This  time  the  stuff  almost  choked 
him  and  he  set  his  glass  down  only  half  empty.  But 
he  put  on  a  brave  front  and  sat  up  straight,  laughing 
a  little.  "  Nice  rooms,  these,"  he  said.  "  Large  and 
airy.  Bit  nicer  than  our  first  rooms  at  Oxford,  eh?  " 
How  different  this  hideous  poison  made  him  look. 
Already  he  was  like  a  fine  building  blurred  by  mist. 

"  It's  extraordinary  what  you  dry  heroes  can  do 
when  you  try,"  said  Kenyon.  "  All  I  hope  is  that 
you'll  come  face  to  face  with  your  fond  parent  pres- 
ently when  you  fumble  your  way  into  your  beautiful 
home."  He  bent  down  and  picked  up  his  photographs 
and  went  on  talking  as  though  to  himself.  "  Yes, 


LIFE  281 

there's  some  satisfaction  in  making  others  pay.  I've 
tried  it  before,  and  know.  I  remember  that  plebeian 
little  hunx  at  Oxford  who  was  going  into  the  Church. 
His  name  was  Jones, — -or  something  of  the  sort.  I 
think  he  was  a  damned  Welshman.  He  once  called 
me  a  '  card  sharp.'  I  didn't  forget  it.  The  first 
night  he  turned  up  in  his  Parson's  clothes  I  doped  him 
and  he  woke  up  next  morning  in  the  gutter.  I  loved 
it.  Now,  then,  Peter,  give  me  a  hand  with  these 
things  and  bring  them  across  the  passage  to  my  bed- 
room." He  pointed  to  some  books  and  left  the  room 
with  his  photographs. 

Peter  got  up  unsteadily  and  rocked  to  and  fro.  He 
picked  up  the  books  as  he  was  directed  and  staggered 
after  his  friend.  He  lurched  into  the  bedroom  and 
stood  in  the  doorway,  supporting  himself.  "  I'm  — 
I'm  drunk,"  he  said,  thickly.  "  Hopelessly  drunk. 
Wha —  what  the  devil  have  you  done  to  me  ?  " 

Kenyon  burst  out  laughing.  Many  times  he  had 
threatened  to  do  this  for  his  friend,  whose  attitude 
of  consistent  healthiness  and  simplicity  had  always 
irritated  him.  He  delighted  at  that  moment  in  seeing 
Peter  all  befogged  and  helpless  and  as  wholly  unable 
to  look  after  himself  as  though  he  were  a  baby. 

"  Now  you'd  better  go,"  he  said  sharply.  He  was 
tired  with  the  episode.  "  I'm  sick  of  the  Guthries ! 
Go  home  and  cling  to  your  bed  while  it  chases  round 
the  room.  I'll  have  jnercy  on  you  however  to  this 
extent.  I'll  put  you  in  a  taxi.  There's  sure  to  be  one 
outside  the  hotel  down  the  street.  Come  on,  you  hulk- 
ing ex-Oxford  man.  Lean  on  me.  Rather  a  para- 


282        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

dox,  isn't  it?  Hitherto  I've  always  leaned  on  you." 
He  got  his  visitor's  hat  and  jammed  it  on  his  head, 
all  cock-eyed.  And  then,  still  talking  and  jibeing  and 
sneering,  he  led  the  uncertain  Peter  down-stairs. 

There  were  two  taxicabs  drawn  up  outside  the  hotel 
to  which  Kenyon  had  referred.  He  shouted  and 
waved  his  hand.  A  chauffeur  mounted  his  box, 
manoeuvred  the  car  around  and  drove  up,  glad  to  get 
a  fare. 

As  he  did  so,  a  night  butterfly  flitted  past,  on  her 
way  home.  She  had  had  apparently  an  unsuccessful 
evening,  for  she  stopped  at  the  sight  of  these  two  men. 
Her  rather  pretty,  thin,  painted  face  wore  an  eager, 
anxious  look.  "  Hello,  dearie !  "  she  said,  and  touched 
Kenyon  on  the  arm. 

"  By  Jove !  "  said  Kenyon  to  himself.     "  By  Jove !  " 

He  was  struck  with  a  new  inspiration.  He  had 
made  his  friend  drunk.  Good!  Now  he  would  send 
him  off  with  a  woman  of  the  streets.  That  would 
complete  his  evening's  work  in  the  most  artistic  fashion, 
and  render  Peter  human  at  last.  And  who  could  tell  ? 
It  might  hit  the  Doctor  fair  and  square, — "  the  tact- 
less, witless,  provincial  fool." 

"  Wait  a  second,"  he  said  to  the  girl,  and  with 
the  able  assistance  of  the  driver  put  the  almost  in- 
animate and  poisoned  Peter  into  the  cab.  Then  he 
turned.  The  night  bird  was  eyeing  him  with  a  curious 
wist  fulness.  She  was  too  smartly  dressed  and  the 
white  tops  of  her  high  boots  gleamed  sarcastically. 
"Well,  dearie?" 

"  There's  a  customer  for  you,"  said  Kenyon,  jerk- 


LIFE  283 

ing  his  finger  towards  the  cab.  "  Take  him  home. 
He  has  money  in  his  pocket.  Help  yourself." 

The  girl  gave  the  driver  her  address  —  which  was 
somewhere  in  the  Sixties  —  and  then,  with  a  little 
chuckle,  jumped  in  and  drew  the  door  to  behind  her 
with  a  bang  that  echoed  through  the  sleeping  street. 

The  cab  drove  away,  and  Kenyon's  laugh  went 
after  it. 

He  was  revenged. 

X 

BUT  for  the  chauffeur,  a  burly  and  obliging  Irish- 
man, Nellie  Pope's  unwilling  and  unconscious  customer 
would  never  have  reached  her  rooms.  They  were  on 
the  top  floor  of  a  brown-stone  house  which  had  no 
elevator.  The  struggle  to  earn  his  own  daily  bread 
made  the  chauffeur  sympathetic.  So  he  got  Peter 
over  his  shoulder,  as  though  he  were  a  huge  sack,  and 
carried  him  step  by  step  up  the  narrow,  ill-lit,  echoing 
staircase.  On  the  top  landing  he  waited,  breathing 
hard,  while  the  girl  opened  the  door  with  her  latch- 
key. 

"Where'll  I  put  him?" 

"  Bring  'im  into  the  bedroom,"  said  the  girl.  "  I'm 
sure  I'm  obliged  to  you  for  the  trouble  you've  taken, 
mister.  You'll  'ave  a  glass  of  beer  before  you  go 
down,  won't  you?" 

"Sure!" 

He  lumped  Peter  on  to  the  bed  with  an  exclamation 
of  relief.  It  groaned  beneath  his  dead  weight.  Mop- 


284        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ping  his  brow  and  running  his  fingers  through  a  shock 
of  thick,  dry  hair,  the  Irishman  looked  down  at  the 
great  body  of  his  own  customer's  evening  catch.  "  I 
guess  I've  seen  a  good  many  drunks  before,"  he  said, 
"  but  this  feller's  fairly  paralyzed.  It's  a  barrel  he 
must  have  had,  or  perhaps  he's  shot  himself  with  one 
of  them  needle  things.  Anyway,  he's  a  fine-looking 
chap." 

Nellie  Pope,  who  had  heard  these  remarks  as  she 
was  pouring  out  a  bottle  of  beer, —  it  was  one  of 
those  apartments  in  which  every  sound  carries  from 
room  to  room  and  in  which  when  you  are  seated  in 
the  kitchen  it  is  possible  to  hear  a  person  cleaning  his 
teeth  in  the  bathroom, —  went  in  and  stood  at  the 
elbow  of  the  chauffeur.  Switching  on  a  light  over 
the  bed  she  peered  into  Peter's  face.  Her  own  lost 
most  of  its  prettiness  under  the  glare.  There  were 
hollows  and  sharpnesses  here  and  there,  the  roots  of 
the  hair  round  her  temples  were  darker  than  the  too- 
bright  gold  of  the  rest  of  it.  There  was,  however, 
something  kind,  and  even  a  little  sweet  about  her 
English  cockney  face  and  shrewd  eyes.  "  Yes  'e's  a 
fine  looking  chap,  isn't  'e, —  a  bit  of  a  giant,  too,  and 
looks  like  a  gentleman.  Poor  boy,  I  wonder  what  that 
feller  did  to  'im !  "  She  put  her  hand  on  Peter's  head 
and  drew  it  back  quickly.  "  'E's  got  a  fever,  I  should 
think.  It  looks  as  if  I  should  'ave  to  play  nurse  to- 
night. Oh,  I  beg  pardon,  mister,  'ere's  your  beer." 

The  Irishman  took  the  glass,  held  it  up  against  the 
light,  made  a  curious  Kaffir-like  click  with  his  tongue 
and  threw  back  his  head.  "  I  guess  that  went  down 


LIFE  285 

fine,"  said  he.  "  One  dollar  and  ten  cents  from  you, 
Miss,  and  I'll  make  no  charge  for  extras."  He  held 
out  a  great  horny  hand. 

Nellie  Pope  opened  her  imitation  gold  bag.  "  Bin 
out  o'  luck  lately,"  she  said.  "  Don't  know  whether 
I've  got  —  No,  I  'aven't.  Oh,  I  know ! "  With  a 
little  laugh  she  bent  over  Peter  again  and  hunted  him 
over  for  some  money.  Finding  a  small  leather  case 
she  opened  it.  It  contained  a  wad  of  bills.  With  a 
rather  comical  air  of  haughty  unconcern  she  handed 
the  chauffeur  two  dollars.  "  Keep  the  change,"  she 
said. 

He  laughed,  pocketed  the  money,  handed  back  the 
glass  and  went  off,  shutting  the  door  behind  him. 

Miss  Pope,  who  had  a  tidy  mind  as  well  as  an 
economical  nature,  took  the  glass  into  the  kitchen  and 
finished  the  bottle  herself.  And  then,  without  remov- 
ing her  hat  and  gloves  she  sat  down  and  counted  the 
money  that  was  contained  in  the  case.  "  One  hundred 
and  twenty-five  dollars,"  she  said.  "  Some  little 
hevening ! " 

She  put  the  case  into  her  bag,  where  it  lay  among 
a  handkerchief,  steeped  in  a  too-pungent  scent,  a  small, 
round  box  of  powder,  a  stick  of  lip  salve,  and  a  few 
promiscuous  dimes.  Then  she  took  off  her  hat  —  a 
curious  net-like  thing  round  which  was  wound  two 
bright  feathers  —  her  coat  and  her  gloves.  The  latter 
she  blew  out  tenderly,  almost  with  deference.  They 
were  white  kid.  All  these  she  put  very  carefully  on  a 
scrupulously  clean  dresser.  Singing  a  little  song  she 
arranged  a  meal  for  herself  on  the  table, —  having 


286       THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

\ 

first  laid  a  cloth.  Bread,  butter  and  sardines  made 
their  appearance,  with  the  remains  of  a  chocolate  cake 
which  had  been  greatly  to  the  taste  of  her  last  night's 
customer,  who  had  not  been,  however,  a  very  generous 
person.  Extremely  hungry,  she  sat  down  and,  with 
the  knowledge  that  her  purse  was  full,  laid  on  the 
butter  with  a  more  careless  hand  than  usual.  While 
she  ate  she  enjoyed  the  bright  dialogue  of  Robert 
Chambers  in  a  magazine  which,  having  first  broken 
its  back  in  order  to  keep  it  open,  she  propped  up 
against  a  bowl.  Half  way  through  the  meal,  she 
jumped  up  suddenly.  "  'Ere !  "  she  said.  "  You  can't 
leave  that  poor  boy  like  that,  you  careless  cat,  and  'im 
lying  with  a  fever!"  She  went  swiftly  into  the  bed- 
room, and  once  more  stood  looking  down  at  the  inert 
form  of  poor  old  Peter.  Then  she  laughed  at  the 
difficulty  of  taking  off  his  clothes,  and  with  a  shrug 
of  her  shoulders  started  pluckily  at  his  boots.  She 
hung  the  coat  and  waistcoat  over  the  back  of  one 
of  the  chairs, —  there  were  only  two, —  and  having 
folded  the  trousers  with  great  care,  returned  to  her 
supper.  It  was  after  two  o'clock  when  finally  she 
crept  quietly  into  bed. 

XI 

A  LITTLE  over  twenty-four  years  before,  Nellie 
Pope  had  been  born  to  two  honest,  hard-working  coun- 
try folk.  They  lived  in  a  village  of  about  two  dozen 
cottages  a  stone's  throw  from  the  great  cross  cut  by 
the  Romans  on  the  chalky  side  of  Chiltern  Hills,  in 


LIFE  287 

England.  Her  parents'  quiver  had  already  been  a  full 
one  and  there  was  indeed  very  little  room  in  it  for 
the  new  arrival.  Eight  other  boys  and  girls  had  pre- 
ceded her  with  a  rapidity  which  must  have  surprised 
nature  herself,  bounteous  as  she  is.  The  father,  a 
deep-chested,  brown-bearded,  very  ignorant,  but  good- 
natured  man,  worked  all  the  year  round  on  a  farm. 
His  wages  were  fourteen  shillings  a  week.  The  wife, 
who  had  been  a  domestic  servant,  added  to  the  family 
pot  by  taking  in  washing  and,  if  able,  helping  at  the 
big  house  when  guests  were  there.  Neither  of  them 
had  ever  been  farther  away  from  their  native  village 
than  the  town  which  lay  in  the  saucer  of  the  valley, 
the  steeple  of  whose  church  could  be  seen  glinting  in 
the  sun  away  below. 

Little  Nellai,  as  she  was  called,  was  thrown  on  her 
own  resources  from  the  moment  that  she  could  crawl 
out  of  the  narrow  kitchen  door  into  the  patch  of  gar- 
den where  potatoes  grew  and  eager  chickens  played 
the  scavenger  for  odd  morsels  of  food.  Her  eldest 
sister  was  her  real  mother,  and  it  was  she  who  daily 
led  her  little  brood  of  dirty-faced  children  out  into 
the  beech  forest  which  stood  in  strange  silence  behind 
the  cottage.  The  monotonous  years  slipped  by  one 
after  another,  enlivened  only  by  a  death  or  a  birth  or 
a  fight,  or  a  very  occasional  jaunt  to  the  town  in  one 
of  the  farm  wagons,  perched  up  on  a  load  of  hay  or 
wedged  in  between  sacks  of  potatoes.  Little  Nellai's 
pretty  face  and  fair  hair  very  soon  made  her  a  pet 
of  the  lady  at  the  big  house,  and  it  was  from  this 
kind,  but  mistaken  person,  from  whom  she  obtained 


288        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

the  seeds  of  discontent  which  at  the  early  age  of  sixteen 
sent  her  into  the  town  as  a  "  help  "  in  the  kitchen  of  a 
man  who  kept  a  garage.  It  was  from  this  place,  on 
the  main  road  to  London,  that  Nellie  Pope  saw  life 
for  the  first  time  and  became  aware  of  the  fact  that 
the  world  was  a  larger  place  than  the  little  village 
perched  up  so  near  the  sky,  and  caught  the  fever  of 
discovery  from  the  white  dust  that  was  left  behind 
by  the  cars  which  sped  to  London  one  way,  and  to 
Oxford  the  other. 

During  this  first  year  among  shops  and  country 
louts,  Nellie  became  aware  of  the  fact  that  her  pretty 
face  and  fair  hair  were  very  valuable  assets.  They 
procured  her  candies  and  many  other  little  presents. 
They  enabled  her  to  make  a  choice  among  the  young 
men  with  whom  to  walk  out.  They  won  smiles  and 
pleasant  words  not  only  from  the  chauffeurs  of  the 
cars  which  came  into  her  master's  garage  to  be  at- 
tended to,  but  also  from  their  owners.  Eventually  it 
was  one  of  these  —  more  unscrupulous  than  most  — 
who,  staying  for  a  few  days  at  the  "  Red  Lion," 
carried  Nellie  away  with  him  to  London,  after  several 
surreptitious  meetings  in  the  shady  lane  at  the  back 
of  the  churchyard.  There  it  was  that  she  saw  life 
with  very  naked  eyes,  passed  quickly  from  one  so-called 
protector  to  another,  was  taken  to  the  United  States 
by  one  of  a  troupe  of  gymnasts,  and  then  deserted. 
For  two  years  she  had  been  numbered  among  the  night 
birds  who  flit  out  after  dark  —  a  member  of  the  oldest 
profession  in  the  world.  There  were,  however,  no 
moments  in  her  life  —  hard,  terrible  and  sordid  as  it 


LIFE  289 

was  —  when  she  looked  back  with  anything  like  regret 
at  those  heavily  thatched  cottages  which  stood  among 
their  little  gardens  on  the  side  of  the  hills.  She 
could  put  up  with  the  fatigue,  brutality  and  uncer- 
tainty, the  gross  actuality  of  her  present  life,  with 
courage,  cheerfulness  and  even  optimism,  but  the  mere 
thought  of  the  deadly  monotony  of  that  peaceful  vil- 
lage, where  summer  followed  winter  with  inexorable 
routine,  made  her  shudder.  The  first  pretty  frock 
which  had  been  given  her  by  the  lady  of  the  big  house 
had  begun  the  work.  The  candies  and  the  little  pres- 
ents from  the  country  louts  had  completed  it ;  and  here 
she  was,  still  very  young,  with  a  heart  still  kind  and 
with  a  nature  not  yet  warped  and  brutalized, —  a 
danger  to  any  community  in  which  she  lived,  the  de- 
liberate spreader  of  something  so  frightful  that  science 
and  civilization  stood  abashed  in  her  presence. 

Vanity  has  much  to  answer  for,  and  out  of  nature 
spring  many  plants  whose  tempting  berries  are  filled 
with  poison. 

It  was  in  the  bed  of  this  wretched  little  woman  that 
the  unconscious  Peter  slept  that  night. 

It  was  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning  when  the  weary 
girl  faced  another  day.  She  didn't  grumble  at  the 
fact  that  she  had  been  frequently  disturbed  and  had 
watched  many  of  the  hours  go  by  while  she  attended 
to  Peter  with  something  of  the  spirit  of  a  Magdalen. 
She  kept  repeating  to  herself :  "  Poor  boy !  Poor  boy ! 
I  wonder  what  his  mother  would  say  if  she  saw  him 
like  this." 

She  bathed  his  head,  listened  with  astonishment  to 


290        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

his  babbling,  and  tried  to  piece  together  his  incoherent 
pleading  with  Ranken  Townsend  and  his  declarations 
to  Betty  of  his  everlasting  love.  She  listened  with 
acute  interest  to  the  broken  sentences  which  showed  her 
that  this  great  big  man-boy  was  endeavoring  to  stir  up 
his  father  to  do  something  which  seemed  to  him  to  be 
urgent  and  vital,  and  she  wondered  who  Graham  was, 
and  Nicholas. 

The  first  thing  that  she  did  when  she  was  dressed 
and  had  put  the  kettle  on  her  gas  stove  to  boil,  was  to 
hunt  through  Peter's  pockets  to  find  out  who  he  was. 
It  was  obvious  to  her  that  he  was  not  so  much  a  cus- 
tomer as  a  patient.  She  was  a  little  afraid  of  accept- 
ing the  whole  responsibility  of  his  case.  The  only 
letter  she  found  was  one  signed  "  Graham,"  headed 
with  the  address  of  an  office  in  Wall  Street.  In  the 
corner  of  it  was  printed  a  telephone  number.  Graham, 
it  was  plain  to  her,  was  a  Christian  name.  She  could 
find  no  suggestion  of  the  surname  of  the  writer  or  of 
the  man  who  lay  so  heavily  in  the  next  room. 

"  I  dunno,"  she  said  to  herself.  "  Something  has 
got  to  be  done.  That  boy's  in  a  bad  way.  'E's  as 
'ot  as  a  pancake  and  I  shouldn't  think  'e's  used  to 
drink  by  the  way  'e  takes  it.  Suppose  hanything 
should  'appen  to  'im  'ere.  I  should  look  funny.  What 
'ad  I  better  do?" 

What  she  did  was  to  have  breakfast.  During  this 
hasty  meal  she  thought  things  over  —  all  her  hard- won 
practicality  at  work  in  her  brain.  Then  she  put  on 
her  befeathered  hat  and  her  white  gloves,  a  second- 
best  pair  of  shoes,  and  went  out  and  along  the  street, 


LIFE  291 

and  into  the  nearest  drug  store.  Here  she  entered 
the  telephone  booth  and  asked  for  the  number  that  was 
printed  on  Graham's  note.  By  that  time  it  was  just 
after  nine  o'clock.  Having  complied  with  the  sharp 
request  to  slip  the  necessary  nickel  into  the  slot,  an 
impatient  voice  recited  the  name  of  the  firm.  "  I 
want  to  speak  to  Mr.  Graham,"  she  said.  "  No  such 
name  —  ?  Well,  keep  your  'air  on,  Mister.  I  may 
be  a  client  —  a  millionaire's  wife  —  for  all  you  know. 
I'm  asking  for  Mr.  Graham  and  as  'e's  a  friend  of 
mine,  and  probably  your  boss,  I'm  not  bothering  about 
his  surname.  You  know  that  as  well  as  I  do —  Do 
I  mean  Mr.  Graham  Guthrie?  Well,  yes.  Who  else 
should  I  mean?"  She  gave  a  chuckle  of  triumph. 
"All  right!  I'll  'old  on." 

In  a  moment  or  two  there  was  another  voice  on  the 
telephone.  "  How  d'you  do?  "  she  said.  "  I'm  hold- 
ing a  letter  signed  by  you,  to  '  Dear  Peter/ —  Ah ! 
I  thought  that  would  make  you  jump —  It  doesn't 
matter  what  my  name  is.  What's  that  — ?  Yes,  I  do 
know  where  he  is.  I've  been  looking  after  'im  all 
night.  Come  up  to  my  place  right  away  and  I'll 
be  there  to  meet  you.  Dear  Peter  is  far  from  well." 
She  gave  her  address,  and  feeling  immensely  relieved 
left  the  box.  But  before  she  left  the  store  she  treated 
herself  to  a  large  box  of  talcum  powder  and  a  medium- 
sized  bottle  of  her  favorite  scent,  paying  the  bill  with 
Peter's  money.  She  considered  herself  to  be  fully 
justified. 

On  the  way  home  she  dropped  into  a  delicatessen 
shop  and  bought  some  sausages,  a  bottle  of  pickles,  a 


292        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

queer  German  salad  of  raw  herring  chopped  up  with 
carrots  and  onions,  and  carried  these  away  with  her. 
On  her  way  up-stairs  —  the  bald,  hard  stairs  —  she 
.was  greeted  by  a  half -dressed  person  whose  hair  was 
in  curl-papers  and  who  had  opened  her  door  to  pick 
up  a  daily  paper  which  lay  outside.  "  Hello,  Miss 
Pope!  Anything  doing?  "  "  Yes,"  said  Nellie  Pope, 
"  the  market's  improving,"  and  she  laughed  and  went 
on. 

Peter  was  still  lying  inert  when  she  bent  over  him 
once  more.  She  felt  his  head  again,  put  the  covers 
about  his  shoulders,  pulled  the  blind  more  closely  over 
the  window,  and  after  having  put  the  food  away  re- 
turned to  make  up  her  face.  She  wasn't  going  to  be 
caught  looking  what  she  called  "  second-rate  "  by  this 
Mr.  Graham  Guthrie  when  he  came. 

There  being  no  need  to  practice  rigid  economy  at 
that  moment,  she  gave  herself  a  glass  of  beer  and  sat 
down  to  pass  the  time  with  her  magazine,  in  which 
life  was  regarded  through  very  rosy  spectacles. 

When  finally  she  opened  the  door,  in  response  to  a 
loud  and  insistent  ring,  her  answer  to  Graham's  abrupt 
question:  "Is  my  brother  here?"  was  "Yes;  why 
shouldn't  he  be?"  She  didn't  like  the  tone.  The 
word  "  here  "  was  underlined  in  an  unnecessarily  un- 
pleasant manner. 

XII 

"  WHAT'S  my  brother  doing  here  ?  "  asked  Graham. 
"  What  d'you  s'pose  ?     Better  go  and  ask  'im  your- 
self." 


LIFE  293 

"Where  is  he?" 

"  In  bed,  if  you  must  know."  The  girl  answered 
sharply.  She  found  her  caller  supercilious.  She 
followed  him  into  the  bedroom,  telling  herself  that 
this  was  a  nice  way  to  be  treated  for  all  the  trouble 
that  she  had  taken. 

Graham  bent  over  the  bed.  "  Good  God !  "  he  said. 
"  What's  the  matter  with  him  ?  " 

"Drink!"  said  the  girl  drily. 

"  Drink !     He  never  drinks." 

"  Then  'e  must  'ave  fallen  off  the  water-wagon  into 
a  barrel  of  alcohol  and  opened  'is  mouth  too  wide. 
Also  'e's  got  a  fever." 

Graham  turned  on  the  girl.  "  How  did  he  get 
here?" 

"  In  a  cab.  You  don't  s'pose  I  carried  'im, 
d'you?" 

"Where'd  you  find  him?" 

"  I  didn't  find  'im.  Some  one  gave  'im  to  me  as  a 
present  —  a  nice  present,  I  must  say." 

"  Don't  lie  to  me!  "  cried  Graham.  "  And  don't  be 
impudent." 

"  Impudent !  "  cride  Nellie  Pope,  shrilly.  "  Here, 
you'd  better  watch  what  you're  saying.  I  don't  stand 
any  cheek,  I  don't,  neither  from  you  nor  anybody 
else,  and  I'm  not  in  the  habit  of  lying.  I  tell  you  I  was 
made  a  present  of  'im.  I  was  told  to  take  'im  'ome 
by  a  young  fellow  on  Forty-eighth  Street,  who  'ad 
called  up  a  cab." 

"  Forty-eighth  Street, —  are  you  sure?  " 

"  Well,  if  I  don't  know  the  streets,  who  does?    The 


294        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

young  fellow  was  a  gent.  He  didn't  talk,  he  gave 
orders.  He  was  tall  and  slight  and  he  'ad  kinky  hair. 
Quite  a  nut.  English,  he  was,  any  one  could  tell 
that." 

"  Good  God!  "  thought  Graham  — "  Kenyon."  He 
sat  down  on  the  bed  as  though  he  had  received  a  blow 
in  the  middle  of  his  back.  Only  an  hour  before  he 
had  telephoned  to  Kenyon  to  say  good-bye  and  wish 
him  a  pleasant  crossing,  and  all  that  he  said  about 
Peter  was  that  they  had  seen  each  other  the  night  be- 
fore. "  No  doubt  he's  all  right,"  he  had  said,  in 
answer  to  Graham's  anxious  question.  What  did  it 
all  mean?  What  foul  thing  had  Kenyon  done? 

Graham  had  been  up  all  night  waiting  for  his 
brother.  He  had  good  news  for  him.  He  had  pulled 
himself  together  and  gone  to  see  Ranken  Townsend 
during  the  time  that  Peter  had  been  walking  the  streets. 
To  the  artist  he  had  made  a  clean  breast  of  everything, 
so  that  he  might,  once  for  all,  set  Peter  right  in  the 
eyes  of  his  future  father-in-law.  That  was  the  least 
that  he  could  do.  He  had  carried  away  from  the 
studio  in  his  pocket  a  short,  generous  and  impulsive 
letter  from  the  artist,  asking  Peter's  forgiveness  for 
not  having  accepted  his  word  of  honor.  Armed  with 
this,  Graham  had  waited  while  hour  after  hour  slipped 
by,  growing  more  and  more  anxious  as  Peter  did  not 
appear.  At  breakfast  he  told  his  mother  —  in  case 
she  should  discover  that  Peter  had  not  returned  —  that 
he  had  stayed  the  night  in  Kenyon's  rooms,  as  they 
had  much  to  talk  about  and  one  or  two  things  to 
arrange.  He  had  been  in  the  house  when  Kenyon 


LIFE  295 

had  rung  up,  apologizing  for  being  unable  to  come 
round,  and  thanking  Mrs.  Guthrie  for  her  kindness  and 
hospitality. 

And  there  lay  Peter  inanimate  and  stupefied.  In 
the  name  of  all  that  was  horrible,  what  had  happened  ? 
Graham  got  up  and  faced  the  girl  again.  "  You 
mustn't  mind  my  being  abrupt  and  rude,"  he  said. 
"  I'm  awfully  sorry.  But  this  is  my  brother,  my  best 
pal,  and  I've  been  terribly  anxious  about  him,  and  you 
don't  know  —  nobody  knows  —  what  it  means  to  me 
to  see  him  like  this." 

"Ah!  Now  you're  talking,"  said  Nellie  Pope. 
"  Treat  me  nicely  and  there's  nothing  I  won't  do  for 
you.  If  you  ask  me  —  and  if  I  don't  know  a  bit 
more  about  life  than  you  do  I  ought  to  —  I  have  a 
shrewd  idea  that  your  brother  was  made  drunk, —  that 
is,  doped.  'E  was  quite  gone  when  'e  was  put  into  the 
cab,  and  from  the  way  that  kinky-headed  chap  laughed 
as  we  drove  off  together, —  I  mean  me  and  your 
brother, —  I  should  think  that  'e  'ad  it  in  for  him,  but 
of  course  I  don't  know  hanything  about  that.  Per- 
haps you  do." 

Graham  shook  his  head.  "  No,"  he  said ;  "  I  don't 
know  anything  about  it  either.  But  what  are  we 
going  to  do  with  him,  that's  the  point  ?  He's  ill,  that's 
obvious,  and  a  doctor  ought  to  see  him  at  once." 

"  That's  what  I  think,"  said  the  girl,  "  and  I  don't 
think  'e  ought  to  be  moved,  'e's  so  frightfully  'ot.  'E 
might  catch  pneumonia,  or  something.  What  I  think 
you'd  better  do  is  to  call  up  a  doctor  at  once,  get  him 
to  give  your  brother  a  dose  and  give  me  directions  as 


296        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

to  what  to  do.  'E  can  stay  'ere  until  'e's  all  right 
again,  and  I'll  nurse  'im." 

"Yes,  but  why  should  you ?" 

"  Oh,  bless  you,  that's  all  right.  I'm  glad  to  have 
something  to  do.  Time  hangs  heavy.  Besides,  the 
poor  boy  is  just  like  a  baby.  I  like  'im  and  you 
needn't  be  afraid  that  I  shall  try  to  get  anything  out 
of  'im,  because  I  shan't." 

Graham  snatched  eagerly  at  the  proffered  assist- 
ance. He  was  intensely  grateful.  "  Have  you  a  tele- 
phone here  ?  "  he  asked. 

Nellie  Pope  laughed.  "  What  d'you  take  me  for  ?  " 
she  said.  "  I'm  not  a  chorus  lady.  When  I  want  to 
use  the  'phone  I  pop  round  to  the  drug  store  and  have 
a  nickel's  worth.  That's  how  I  got  on  to  you." 

Graham  caught  up  his  hat  and  left  the  apartment 
quickly.  One  of  his  college  friends  was  a  doctor  and 
had  just  started  to  practice.  He  would  ask  him  to 
come  and  see  Peter.  He  agreed  with  the  girl  that  it 
would  be  running  a  great  risk  to  move  Peter,  and  he 
was  all  against  taking  him  home  in  his  present  con- 
dition. It  would  only  lead  to  more  lies  and  would 
certainly  throw  his  mother  into  a  dreadful  state  of 
anxiety. 

While  he  was  gone,  Nellie  Pope  set  to  work  to  tidy 
up  the  bedroom.  She  put  her  boots  away  in  a  closet, 
got  out  a  clean  bedspread,  rubbed  the  powder  off  her 
mirror  and  arranged  her  dressing-table.  This  doctor, 
whoever  he  was,  should  find  her  apartment  as  tidy  as 
she  could  make  it.  It  was  a  matter  of  pride  with  her. 
She  still  had  some  of  that  left.  One  thing,  however, 


LIFE  297 

she  was  determined  about.     The  doctor  must  not  be 
allowed  to  look  too  closely  at  her. 


XIII 

GRAHAM  came  out  of  the  telephone  box  in  the  drug 
store.  Dr.  Harding  was  unable,  he  said,  to  leave  his 
office  for  an  hour  and  a  half,  when  he  would  drive  to 
Nellie  Pope's  address  and  meet  Graham  in  her  apart- 
ment. 

But  as  he  was  hurrying  back  to  Peter's  bedside, 
Graham  drew  up  suddenly.  The  rage  that  had  en- 
tered into  his  soul  when  he  had  gathered  that  Kenyon 
was  responsible  for  his  brother's  condition  broke  into 
a  blaze.  Almost  before  he  knew  what  he  was  doing 
or  what  he  was  going  to  do  when  he  got  there,  he  hailed 
a  passing  taxi  and  told  the  man  to  drive  to  Kenyon's 
apartment.  He  remembered  that  the  liner  was  not 
due  to  leave  until  two-thirty.  Kenyon  would  there- 
fore be  at  home  for  some  time  yet.  He  told  himself 
that  he  must  see  him  —  he  must.  He  owed  it  to 
Peter  first,  and  then  to  himself  as  Peter's  brother  and 
pal,  to  make  Kenyon  answer  for  this  dirty  and  disloyal 
trick.  Yes,  that  was  it,  he  told  himself  as  the  cab 
bowled  quickly  to  its  destination.  Kenyon  must  be 
made  to  answer,  or,  at  any  rate,  to  offer  some  ex- 
tenuating explanation  if  he  could.  It  would  be  some- 
thing that  would  make  him  wake  up  in  the  middle  of 
the  night  and  curse  himself  if  he  let  the  opportunity 
slip  out  of  his  hands  to  face  Kenyon  up  before  he  went 


298        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

immaculately,  unquestioned  and  perhaps  unpunished 
out  of  their  lives.  How  could  he  face  Peter  when  he 
was  well  again?  How  could  he  look  at  his  own  re- 
flection in  the  looking-glass  if,  for  reasons  of  his  per- 
sonal admiration  of  Kenyon  and  disinclination  to  force 
things  to  an  issue,  he  let  him  escape  without  finding 
out  the  truth? 

The  cab  stopped.  Graham  sprang  out,  paid  the 
man,  ran  up  the  flight  of  stone  steps  and  rang  the  bell. 
None  too  quickly  it  was  answered  by  a  girl  with  a  mass 
of  black  hair  and  a  pair  of  Irish  eyes  which  had  been 
put  in  with  a  dirty  finger. 

"Is  Mr.  Kenyon  in?" 

"  Yes." 

The  hall  was  filled  with  baggage.  A  very  distinct 
"  K  "  was  on  all  the  baggage  tabs. 

"  All  right !  "  said  Graham.  "  I  know  my  way 
up." 

Rather   sharply   Kenyon   called   out   "  Come   in ! 
when  Graham  knocked  on  the  door  of  the  sitting- 
room. 

In  a  much-waisted  suit  of  brown  clothes,  a  brown 
tie  and  a  pair  of  brown  shoes  which  were  so  highly 
polished  as  to  look  almost  hot,  Kenyon  was  standing 
with  the  telephone  receiver  to  his  ear.  He  was  say- 
ing "  Good-bye  "  to  one  of  the  men  to  whom  Graham 
had  been  proud  to  introduce  him  and  whose  pockets  he 
had  already  lightened  by  a  fairly  considerable  sum. 
He  finished  speaking  before  turning  to  see  who  had  en- 
tered, and  hung  up  the  receiver. 

"Oh,  hello,  my  dear  fellow!  "  he  said.     "  I  didn't 


LIFE  299 

expect  to  see  you.  How  extremely  and  peculiarly 
pleasant !  " 

Graham  wondered  if  he  would  think  so  by  the  time 
that  he  had  done  with  him.  But,  with  a  strong  effort 
of  will,  he  kept  his  self-control.  He  intended  to  let 
Kenyon  give  himself  away.  That  seemed  to  be  the 
best  plan. 

Kenyon  gave  him  no  chance  to  speak.  "  Not  satis- 
fied with  wishing  me  '  bon  voyage  '  over  the  wire,  eh  ? 
By  jove,  this  is  most  friendly  of  you.  You'll  help 
kill  the  boring  time  before  I  drive  off  to  the  docks 
with  all  my  duly  and  laboriously  labelled  luggage. 
Make  yourself  at  home,  old  boy,  and  give  me  your 
news." 

He  took  his  hat  and  stick  and  yellow  gloves  out 
of  the  one  comfortable  chair  and  waved  his  hand 
toward  it. 

Graham  remained  standing.  Having  seen  Peter 
lying  in  such  a  bed,  inert  and  humiliated, —  Peter,  of 
all  men, —  he  resented  Kenyon's  suave  cordiality  and 
glib  complacency.  "  I've  just  come  from  Peter,"  he 
said. 

Kenyon  burst  out  laughing.  "  Oh,  do  tell  me ! 
How  does  he  look  ?  Is  his  head  as  big  as  the  dome  of 
St.  Paul's  this  morning?  It  ought  to  be.  I  gave  him 
the  sort  of  mixture  that  would  blow  most  men  sky- 
high.  It's  never  been  known  to  fail." 

"It  hasn't?"  said  Graham.  "So  you  did  give  it 
to  him !  "  he  added  inwardly.  "  Good !  You'll  pay 
for  that" 

"  I  was  amazed  to  see  the  thirsty  way  our  abstem- 


300        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ious  Peter  lapped  it  down.  I've  a  sneaking  notion 
that  he  liked  it.  It  was  on  an  empty  stomach,  too. 
He  seems  to  have  been  in  an  emotional  mood  yester- 
day—  tramping  the  streets.  Ye  gods,  how  these 
sentimentalists  go  to  pieces  under  the  influence  of  a 
bit  of  a  girl!  He  came  up  here  fairly  late,  just  after 
Belle  —  I  mean,  just  after " 

"Belle?  Was  Belle  here  last  night,  then?"  Gra- 
ham's voice  rang  out  sharply. 

"  Yes,"  said  Kenyon,  with  a  curious  smile.  After 
all,  what  did  it  matter  now  who  knew?  He  was  on 
the  verge  of  sailing  and  he  hoped  that  he  might  never 
see  this  family  of  Guthries  again.  "  Yes,  Belle  was 
here." 

There  was  a  look  in  the  corners  of  Kenyon's  eyes 
that  sent  a  spasm  of  fear  all  through  Graham's  body. 
What  was  this  man  not  capable  of  doing  since  he  had 
deliberately  turned  Peter,  his  friend,  over  to  a  street- 
walker, having  first  rendered  him  senseless  ?  "  Then 
I'm  here  for  Belle,  as  well,"  he  said  to  himself,  "  and 
whatever  you  did  you'll  pay  for  that  too." 

There  was  an  empty  cardboard  collar-box  on  the 
floor.  Kenyon  gave  it  a  spiteful  kick.  "  Yes,  Belle 
and  I  had, —  what  shall  I  call  it?  —  a  rather  tender 
parting  scene  here  last  night, —  quite  tender,  in  fact. 
All  very  amusing  in  the  sum  total  of  things,  eh?  I 
was  peculiarly  ready  for  Peter  when  he  dropped  in. 
And,  by  the  way,  how  on  earth  did  you  find  out  where 
he  spent  the  night,  learning,  I  trust,  to  shake  off  some 
of  his  Quaker  notions  ?  " 

"  She  rang  me  up,"  said  Graham,  whose  fists  were 


LIFE  301 

clenched  so  tightly  that  every  finger  contained  a  pulse. 
He  was  almost  ready  to  hit  —  almost.  He  was  only 
waiting  for  one  other  proof  of  this  dirty  dog's 
treachery. 

"  Oh,  did  she  ?  Found  your  name  and  address  in 
Peter's  pocket,  I  suppose.  Well,  she  came  along  last 
night  at  the  exact  psychological  moment.  The  alacrity 
with  which  she  took  dear  old  drunken  Peter  off  my 
hands  at  the  merest  hint  had  a  certain  amount  of 
pathos  about  it.  He's  off  his  immaculate  perch  now, 
eh?  He's  left  his  tuppenny  halo  on  a  pretty  sordid 
hat-peg,  at  last,  eh?  He'll  thank  me  for  having  done 
it  for  him  one  of  these  days,  I'll  be  bound." 

Graham  went  slowly  over  to  him.  "  Not  one  of 
these  days,"  he  said  with  extreme  distinctness. 
"  Through  me,  thank  God,  to-day  —  now." 

Kenyon  darted  a  quick  look  at  the  man  who  had 
always  caused  him  a  considerable  amount  of  inward 
laughter,  whom  he  had  labelled  as  a  precocious  pro- 
vincial. He  saw  that  his  face  had  gone  as  white  as  a 
stone  —  that  his  nostrils  were  all  distended  and  that 
his  eyes  seemed  to  have  become  bloodshot.  No 
coward,  Kenyon  had  an  inherent  detestation  of  a 
fracas,  especially  when  he  was  dressed  for  the  street. 
He  decided  to  avert  a  row  with  a  touch  of  autocratic 
authority.  It  had  worked  before. 

"  Let  there  be  no  vulgar  display  of  pugilism  here," 
he  said,  sharply.  "If  you  don't  like  my  methods,  get 
out!" 

Everything  in  Graham's  nature  seemed  to  have  be- 
come concentrated  in  one  big  ball  of  desire  to  hit  and 


302        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

hit,  and  hit  again  —  to  hear  the  heavy  thud  of  his 
blows  on  that  man's  body  —  to  see  him  lying  squirm- 
ing and  broken  on  the  carpet  with  a  receipt  in  full  upon 
his  face  for  all  that  he  had  done. 

"  Put  up  your  fist,"  he  said,  "  or  I  shall  have  to  hit 
you  cold." 

"Curse  you,  get  out!"  cried  Kenyon,  catching 
Graham  one  on  the  mouth  before  he  was  ready. 

Graham  laughed.  He  needed  that.  By  jove,  he 
needed  that.  He  let  out  his  left.  "  That's  for 
Peter,"  he  said. 

Kenyon  staggered.  His  left  eye  seemed  to  fill. 
With  a  yell  of  pain  he  jumped  in  and  hit  wildly. 

Graham  waited  a  second  chance  and  got  it.  "  And 
that's  for  Belle,"  he  said.  And  his  knuckles  bled  with 
the  contact  of  teeth. 

Kenyon  went  in  again.  Chairs  fell  over  and  the 
table  was  pushed  aside.  And  all  the  time  that  he 
failed  to  reach  Graham's  face  he  screamed  like  a  horse 
whose  stable  is  in  flames. 

But  Graham,  cold,  icy  cold,  and  cooler  than  he  had 
ever  been  in  his  life,  played  with  him.  He  had  never 
been  so  much  a  man  in  his  life.  He  warded  and 
guarded  and  waited  hoping  that  he  might  once  more 
feel  the  sting  of  pain  that  would  make  his  last  blow 
unforgetable  —  epoch-making. 

He  got  it, —  but  with  Kenyon's  foot. 

And  again  Graham  laughed, —  for  joy  —  for  very 
joy.  Now  he  could  hit,  and  hit  honestly. 

"  You  little  gentleman !  "  he  said.  "  You  perfect 
little  gentleman  —  I've  paid  you  for  Peter,  and  for 


LIFE  303 

Belle.  Here's  my  debt,  with  a  hundred  per  cent,  in- 
terest and  then  some." 

The  blow,  hard  and  firm  from  the  full  shoulder, 
caught  Kenyon  on  the  point  of  the  jaw,  lifted  him 
off  his  feet  and  laid  him  out  full  stretch  on  the  broad 
of  his  back. 

For  several  moments,  breathing  hard,  Graham  stood 
over  him,  looking  down  at  the  dishevelled,  unconscious 
dandy,  with  his  bad  blood  all  over  his  face  and 
clothes.  His  collar  had  sprung,  his  beautiful  brown 
tie  had  gone  round  under  his  ear,  his  shirt  cuffs  were 
dabbled  with  red,  one  eye  was  bunged  up  and  his  mouth 
was  all  swollen. 

Then  Graham  rang  the  bell,  and  while  waiting 
tidied  himself  up  in  front  of  the  glass  in  which  he  now 
felt  that  he  could  look. 

The  girl  came  in  and  gave  a  shrill  cry. 

"  Just  see  to  that  man,  please.  Cold  water  at  once 
will  be  the  best  thing." 

He  caught  up  his  hat,  went  out,  shut  the  door,  ran 
down-stairs,  let  himself  into  the  street  and  was  out  of 
sight  and  into  a  taxicab  before  the  girl  had  recovered 
herself. 

"  Paid  in  full,"  he  said  breathlessly  to  himself,  as 
he  bound  up  his  knuckles — "  in  full." 


XIV 

WITH  wide-eyed  anxiety,  Graham,  having  driven 
straight  back,  waited  for  the  doctor's  verdict.     The 


304        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

two  young  men  stood  alone  in  the  little  sitting-room. 
With  a  touch  of  delicacy,  which  they  were  quick  to 
notice,  Nellie  Pope  made  no  attempt  to  follow  them  in. 

"Um!"  said  Dr.  Harding.  "A  very  close  shave 
from  pneumonia.  He  can't  be  moved  yet,  unless,  of 
course,  you'd  like  me  to  send  for  an  ambulance. 
That's  up  to  you." 

Graham  shook  his  head.  "  No,"  he  said.  "  I  don't 
want  that.  I  think  he'd  better  be  —  I  mean  I  don't 
want  my  father —  Oh,  well,  I  dare  say  you  under- 
stand." 

"  Yes,"  said  Dr.  Harding,  "  I'm  afraid  I  do.  God 
knows  what  the  percentage  of  disaster  is  from  men 
having  soused  themselves  like  that.  It  seems  to  me 
that  your  brother,  who  had  obviously  caught  a  severe 
chill,  must  have  set  out  deliberately  to  make  himself 
drunk,  and  mixed  everything  in  sight." 

Graham  held  his  peace.  But  his  blood  tingled  at 
the  knowledge  that  he  had  given  Kenyon  something 
that  he  would  never  forget  and  which  would  make  it 
necessary  for  him  to  remain  in  the  seclusion  of  his 
state-room  for  some  days  at  least. 

The  young  doctor  sat  down  and  wrote  a  prescrip- 
tion and  went  on  quickly  to  tell  Graham  what  to  .do. 
Finally  he  rose.  "  I'll  look  in  again  this  evening,"  he 
said.  "You'll  be  here,  won't  you?  Of  course  we 
shall  get  him  all  right  in  a  couple  of  days  or  so, —  that 
is,  right  enough  to  go  home, —  but " 

"  But  what  ?  "  asked  Graham. 

"Well,"  said  Dr.  Harding,  "I  may  have  to 
leave  the  rest  of  the  treatment  to  your  father."  He 


LIFE 


305 


shook  his  head  several  times  on  his  way  to  the  door. 
He  had  taken  one  or  two  close,  examining  looks  of 
Nellie  Pope. 

"  Mr.  Guthrie,  you're  wanted." 

Graham  turned  sharply.  Nellie  Pope,  waiting  until 
the  doctor  had  gone,  put  her  head  in  at  the  door. 
"  Come  on  in,"  she  said.  "  Come  on  in !  " 

Graham  followed  her  into  the  bedroom  and  bent 
over  Peter.  Opening  his  eyes  with  some  difficulty, 
as  though  they  hurt  him,  Peter  looked  about.  The 
room  was  strange.  The  face  of  the  girl  was  strange. 
The  whole  thing  seemed  to  belong  to  a  dream.  Then 
he  recognized  his  brother.  "  You  got  away,  then," 
he  said. 

"Got  away?" 

"  Yes.  By  Jove,  what  a  blaze !  The  last  time  I 
saw  you,  you  were  carrying  mother  along  the  passage. 
I  could  hardly  see  you  for  smoke.  I  got  Betty  out 
into  the  street  and  dived  back  into  the  house.  Father 
was  the  only  one  left.  Good  God,  what  awful  flames ! 
The  library  was  red  hot.  I  got  into  the  middle  of  it, 
choking  and  yelling  for  father,  when  something  fell  on 
my  head.  Is  he  —  dead  ?  " 

"  No,"  said  Graham.     "  He's  all  right." 

A  little  smile  broke  out  on  Peter's  face  and  he 
sighed  and  turned  over  and  went  to  sleep  again. 

Nellie  Pope  made  a  comical  grimace.  "  I  don't 
wonder  that  Ys  been  dreaming  about  a  fire,"  she 
whispered.  She  arranged  the  covers  over  Peter's 
shoulder  with  a  deft  and  sympathetic  hand,  and  then 
took  Graham's  arm  and  led  him  out  into  the  passage. 


306        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  You've  got  your  work.  Push  off.  I'll  see  to  the 
medicine  when  it  comes.  Don't  you  worry.  Get 
back  as  soon  as  you  can,  and  while  you're  away  I'll 
look  after  'im  like  a  sister.  I  like  'im,  poor  boy !  My 
goodness!  why  don't  somebody  put  the  lid  on  all  the 
distilleries?  Half  the  troubles  in  the  world  'ud  be  pre- 
vented that  way !  " 

Very  reluctantly  Graham  acted  on  the  girl's  sugges- 
tion that  he  should  return  to  his  office.  He  was  in 
the  middle  of  very  important  work.  He  held  out  his 
hand.  "  You're  a  damned  good  little  sort,"  he  said, 
"  and  I'm  intensely  grateful." 

Nellie  Pope's  eyes  filled  with  tears.  It  had  been  a 
long  time  since  she  had  been  treated  so  humanly  or 
had  her  hand  so  warmly  clasped.  But  she  screwed 
out  a  laugh  and  waved  her  hand  to  Graham  as  he  let 
himself  out. 

She  spent  the  rest  of  the  day  in  and  out  of  the  bed- 
room. With  her  eyes  continually  on  her  clock,  she 
devoted  herself  untiringly  and  with  the  utmost  effi- 
ciency to  looking  after  her  patient.  To  the  very  in- 
stant she  gave  him  his  medicine  and  said  cheery,  pleas- 
ant things  to  him  every  time  she  had  to  wake  him  up 
to  administer  it.  It  was  an  odd  and  wonderful  day 
for  her,  as  well  as  for  Peter, —  filled  with  many  touches 
of  curious  comedy,  the  comedy  of  life  —  and  many 
moments  of  queer  pathos.  Once  she  had  to  listen  to  a 
little  outburst  of  incoherent  love,  when  Peter  insisted 
on  telling  her  what  an  angel  Betty  was.  Once  she  was 
obliged  to  hear  what  Peter  had  to  say  about  his  father, 
from  which  she  gathered  that  this  man  was  responsible 


LIFE  307 

for  the  burning  house  from  which  this  boy  had  only 
just  been  able  to  escape  alive,  having  saved  his  family. 
The  obsession  of  fire  remained  with  Peter  until  the 
evening,  when  he  woke  up  with  a  clear  brain,  and 
having  taken  his  medicine,  looked  at  her  with  new 
eyes. 

"  What's  all  this?  "  he  asked  quietly.  "  Where  arri 
I,  and  who  are  you  ?  " 

"  Oh,  that's  all  right,"  said  Nellie  Pope. 

"  Is  it  ?     Are  you  a  nurse  ?  " 

"  Yes,"  she  said. 

"  Is  this  a  hospital  ?  " 

"  Yes, —  that  is,  a  nursing  home,"  she  said. 

"  Oh !  "  said  Peter.     "  Where's  Kenyon  ?  " 

"  I  don't  know,  dearie." 

"  What  on  earth  was  that  filth  that  he  gave  me  to 
drink?  I  carried  the  books  into  his  room,  and  then 
I'm  hanged  if  I  can  remember —  I've  got  a  most 
frightful  headache.  Every  time  I  move  my  head 
seems  to  split  in  half.  How  long  have  I  been  here? 
Was  I  poisoned,  or  what  ?  " 

"  Now  don't  you  talk  or  you'll  get  me  into  trouble. 
You  go  off  to  sleep  like  a  good  boy.  You'll  be  all 
right  in  the  morning." 

"Shall  I?  That's  good."  And  he  heaved  a  big 
sigh  and  obeyed.  It  was  extraordinary  how  sleep 
came  to  his  rescue. 

He  was  still  asleep  when  Graham  came  back  at  six 
o'clock.  Nellie  Pope  opened  the  door  to  him.  "  'E's 
getting  on  fine,"  she  said.  "  You  can  take  that  line 
out  of  your  forehead.  'E's  been  talking  quite  sensibly 


308        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

to  me.  What  I  don't  know  about  your  father  and 
your  family  isn't  worth  knowing." 

Graham  tiptoed  into  the  bedroom,  drew  a  chair  up 
to  the  side  of  the  bed  and  sat  down.  And  while  he 
waited  for  the  time  to  arrive  for  Peter's  next  dose 
many  strange  things  ran  through  his  brain, —  his  own 
precocity  —  his  own  desire  to  be  smart  and  become  a 
man  of  the  world  —  his  own  evening  in  the  little  shabby 
theatrical  lodgings  in  Oxford  with  Kenyon  —  his 
dealings  with  Ita  Strabosck  —  the  night  he  had  spent 
in  his  bed-room  when  Peter  took  his  razors  away  — 
that  awful  hour  when  he  sneaked  into  his  father's 
laboratory  and  under  the  pressure  of  great  trouble 
forged  his  name.  The  only  thing  that  gave  him  any 
sense  of  pleasure  out  of  all  this  was  the  fact  that  he 
carried  in  his  pocket  a  warm  and  spontaneous  letter 
from  Ranken  Townsend,  which  he  knew  would  be 
better  to  Peter  than  pints  of  medicine. 

And  while  he  sat  watching,  Nellie  Pope  ate  her 
sausage  in  the  kitchen  and  finished  the  instalment  of 
the  love  story  in  her  magazine. 

What  a  world,  O  my  masters ! 


IT  was  late  when  Graham  let  himself  into  his 
father's  house  that  night.  He  had  done  many  things 
that  day.  He  had  also  been  through  much  anxiety. 
He  felt  that  he  deserved  the  right  to  turn  in  at  once 
and  sleep  the  sleep  of  the  just.  But  Kenyon  had  said 


LIFE  309 

that  Belle  had  been  alone  in  his  rooms  the  night  be- 
fore and  the  queer  expression  that  had  come  into  his 
eyes  as  he  made  the  remark  lived  most  uneasily  in 
Graham's  memory.  He  now  knew  Nicholas  Kenyon 
to  be  a  skunk  —  an  unscrupulous  individualist  devoid 
of  loyalty,  incapable  of  feeling  true  friendship  and  in 
every  way  unfit  to  have  any  dealings,  unwatched,  with 
a  girl  unless  she  was  in  his  own  set  or  belonged  to 
the  same  class  as  the  two  chorus  girls  for  whom 
he  had  waited  outide  the  stage  door  of  the  Oxford 
Theatre. 

He  was  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  Belle  had  been 
something  more  than  merely  attracted  by  Kenyon. 
He  had  even  hoped  that  she  might  be  engaged  to  be 
married  to  him,  being  very  proud  to  believe  that  some 
day  soon  she  might  become  the  wife  of  the  man  under 
whose  spell  he,  like  all  the  rest  of  the  family,  had 
fallen.  Now,  however,  in  the  light  of  Kenyon's 
hideous  treatment  of  Peter,  he  saw  his  one-time  hero 
with  eyes  from  which  all  the  glamour  of  his  appearance 
had  disappeared  and  he  was  filled  with  an  overwhelm- 
ing desire  to  see  Belle  at  once  and  make  it  clear  to  her, 
bluntly  and  finally,  that  she  must  clear  Kenyon  out 
of  her  mind  as  a  house  is  rid  of  vermin.  Belle  was, 
as  he  well  knew,  a  high-spirited,  amazingly  imperious, 
independent  girl,  with  strong  emotions.  She  was  not 
one  who  would  be  turned  lightly,  or  even  driven,  out 
of  a  line  of  thought.  She  was,  on  the  contrary,  as 
difficult  to  treat  as  an  unbroken  filly  and  could  only 
be  managed  with  the  lightest  of  hands.  If  she  really 
and  truly  loved  Kenyon  and  still  believed  in  him,  he 


310        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

knew  that  he  could  not  say  anything  that  would 
prejudice  him  in  her  estimation,  even  by  telling  her 
what  he  had  done  to  Peter.  She  would  be  able  to 
produce  reasons,  however  far-fetched,  to  make  that 
incident  seem  less  ugly.  There  was,  however,  the 
chance  —  just  the  chance  —  that  she  would  be  open  to 
conviction.  After  much  inward  argument  and  hesi- 
tation he  decided  to  go  up  to  Belle's  room,  and  if  she 
were  not  asleep,  to  have  a  little  talk  with  her  and  find 
out  how  the  land  lay,  and  if  he  could  see  any  possibility 
of  adding  to  his  punishment  of  Kenyon  to  do  so  by 
putting  him  in  his  true  colour  before  Belle. 

It  took  him  some  time  to  come  to  this  decision  and 
screw  up  his  courage  to  face  Belle.  For  nearly  an 
hour  he  paced  up  and  down  the  quiet  library,  smoking 
cigarette  after  cigarette.  Belle  was  likely  to  tell  him 
to  go  and  hang  himself  if  she  considered  that  he  was 
butting  into  her  private  affairs.  He  knew  this, —  no 
one  better.  He  had  often  done  so  before.  He  de- 
cided, however,  to  run  this  risk  and,  in  the  hope  that 
she  might  still  be  up,  went  upstairs  and  stood  for  a 
moment  listening  outside  her  door.  He  could  hear 
no  sound  in  her  room,  no  movement,  no  creak  of  a 
drawer  being  opened  or  shut.  He  knocked  softly  and 
waited,—  was  just  going  to  knock  again  when  the  door 
was  opened. 

With  her  beautiful  black  hair  done  for  the  night 
and  a  pink  kimono  over  her  night-dress,  Belle  stood  in 
the  doorway  with  an  expression  of  surprised  inquiry 
in  her  eyes.  These  two  had  not  taken  the  trouble  to 
be  very  good  friends  for  some  years. 


LIFE  311 

"  Oh,  it's  you,  Graham,"  she  said,  but  made  no 
move. 

"It's  awfully  late,  I  know;  but,  if  you're  not  too 
tired,  may  I  come  in?"  Graham  hated  himself  for 
being  self-conscious.  It  seemed  absurd  with  his  own 
sister.  He  wished  then  that  he  had  not  been  quite 
so  selfish  and  self-contained  since  he  had  considered 
himself  to  be  a  man,  and  had  gone  out  of  his  way  to 
keep  up  his  old  boyish  relations  with  Belle. 

He  was  a  little  surprised  when  she  said,  "  Come  in, 
dear,"  and  made  way  for  him.  He  noticed  quickly  as 
soon  as  she  stood  und^r  the  light  that  her  eyes  were 
red  and  swollen,  and  that  there  was  a  most  unusual 
air  about  her  of  gentleness  and  dejection.  He  noticed, 
too,  with  immense  relief,  that  a  large  photograph  of 
Kenyon  in  hunting-kit  which  he  had  seen  standing  on 
her  dressing-table  had  been  taken  away.  A  good  sign ! 

The  room  was  very  different  from  Ethel's.  It  had 
nothing  of  that  rather  anaemic  ultra-modern  air  so 
carefully  cultivated  by  the  younger  girl.  On  the  con- 
trary, everything  in  it  was  characteristic  of  Belle.  It 
was  full  of  ripe  colours  and  solid  comfort.  A  mass  of 
silver  things  jostled  each  other  untidily  on  the  dressing- 
table.  A  collection  of  monthly  fashion  papers  with 
vivid  decorative  covers  lay  on  a  heap  on  a  chair,  and  a 
novel,  open  in  the  middle,  had  been  flung,  face  down, 
on  the  sofa.  There  was  no  attempt  at  carefully 
shaded  lights.  They  were  all  turned  on  and  were  re- 
flected from  the  long  glasses  in  a  large  mahogany 
wardrobe.  The  carpet  all  round  the  dressing-table 
was  bespattered  with  white  powder. 


312        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  I  was  reading'  when  I  heard  your  knock,"  she 
said, — "  at  least  I  was  pretending  to  read.  Sleep  was 
miles  away." 

Graham  sat  down,  hanging  a  pair  of  stockings  over 
the  arm  of  the  chair.  "  Why?  "  he  asked. 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know,  I've  been  thinking, —  for  a 
change.  It's  such  a  new  thing  for  me  that  it  knocked 
sleep  out  of  my  head.  Not  nice  thoughts,  either." 

She  seemed  glad  to  talk,  Graham  thought.  "  Any- 
thing the  matter,  Bee  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  I  guess  it's  nearly  a  century  since  you  called  me 
Bee,"  she  said  with  a  queer  little  laugh.  "  Would  you 
say  that  anything  was  the  matter  if  you  had  just  picked 
yourself  out  of  the  ruins  of  a  house  that  had  fallen 
about  your  ears?  " 

Graham  got  up  suddenly,  sat  on  the  sofa  at  Belle's 
side  and  put  his  arms  round  her  shoulder.  "  Don't 
dodge  behind  phrases,  old  girl,"  he  said.  "  Just  tell 
me  in  plain  English.  Let  me  help  you  if  I  can." 

But  Belle  shook  him  off, —  not  angry  with  him  so 
much  as  with  herself.  She  detested  weakness.  This 
unexpected  kindness  on  Graham's  part  made  her  feel 
like  crying  again.  In  her  heart  she  longed  for  some 
one  to  whom  she  could  pour  out  her  soul,  and  Gra- 
ham's affection  almost  caught  her  before  she  could 
stop  herself.  Not  to  him,  she  told  herself,  nor  to  any 
member  of  her  family,  was  she  going  to  confess  the 
sort  of  thoughts  that  had  choked  her  brain  ever  since 
that  hour  alone  with  Kenyon.  Not  even  to  Betty,  to 
whom  she  told  most  things,  was  she  going  to  lay  bare 
the  fact  that,  in  the  cold  light  of  day,  she  found  herself 


LIFE  313 

deeply  hurt  and  deeply  humiliated  at  Kenyon's  treat- 
ment of  her.  In  fact,  she  had  herself  only  that  night 
begun  to  realize  the  state  of  her  feelings  and  was  still 
suffering  under  the  discovery. 

Graham,  whose  nature  and  character  were  as  much 
like  those  of  Belle  as  though  they  were  twins,  caught 
her  mental  attitude  as  she  stood  struggling  between 
pride  and  a  desire  to  tell  the  truth.  It  was  as  plain 
to  him  as  though  she  had  already  confessed  that  Ken- 
yon  had  done  something  which  had  shaken  her  belief 
in  him.  His  photograph,  which  had  dominated  her 
room,  had  been  put  away.  Her  eyes  were  red  and 
swollen.  All  his  sympathy  was  stirred.  At  the  same 
time  he  rejoiced  in  the  eager  thought  that  he  had  it 
in  his  power  to  clear  Kenyon  finally  out  of  her 
mind. 

He  set  to  work  quietly.  "  I'm  going  to  tell  you 
about  Peter,"  he  said. 

She  turned  quickly.  "  Peter  ?  There's  nothing 
wrong  with  Peter,  is  there  ?  " 

"  God  knows  how  much  wrong  there  is.  I'm  going 
to  tell  you  all  I  know.  We're  all  in  this, —  through 
Kenyon,  and  because  we've  been  thoughtless  fools 
running  amuck  through  life." 

The  idea  of  there  being  anything  wrong  with  Peter 
brought  Belle  quickly  out  of  self-analysis  and  the  self- 
indulgence  of  her  own  pain.  "  Don't  beat  about  the 
bush,"  she  said.  "  Please  tell  me.  You  told  mother 
this  morning  that  he  had  stayed  with  Nicholas  last 
night." 

"  That  was  a  lie.     This  is  what  happened.     After 


3H        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

a  rotten  day  worrying  about  an  upset  with  Betty,  he 
went  to  see  Kenyon  late  last  night.  He'd  had  nothing 
to  eat.  I  believe  because  Kenyon  had  been  disap- 
pointed about  something  earlier  in  the  evening, —  but 
I  only  make  a  guess  at  that  from  the  way  he  looked 
when  I  saw  him  to-day, —  he  deliberately  took  it  out 
on  Peter." 

"On  Peter?  How?"  Belle  understood  this  dis- 
appointment only  too  well. 

"  He  made  him  drunk." 

"Drunk!  — Peter!" 

"  Dead  drunk, —  by  doping  him  with  a  fearful  mix- 
ture of  all  the  drinks  he  had.  He  had  always  threat- 
ened to  do  it,  and  this  time  he  caught  Peter  napping. 
That  was  a  foul  enough  thing  to  do  anyway,  but  it 
didn't  satisfy  him.  He  got  him  into  the  street  and  in- 
stead of  putting  him  into  a  cab  and  sending  him  home 
he  called  a  passing  woman " 

"Oh,  no!"  cried  Belle. 

"  Yes, —  and  gave  Peter  over  to  her  and  there  he's 
been,  in  her  bed,  in  a  little  hole  of  an  apartment,  ill 
and  poisoned,  ever  since." 

"Oh,  my  God!"  cried  Belle. 

"  The  woman  rang  me  up  early  this  morning  and  I 
got  Ralph  Harding  to  go  and  see  what  he  could  do. 
I've  been  there  most  of  the  day, —  except  for  ten  min- 
utes with  Kenyon  —  the  best  ten  minutes  I  ever  put 
in  —  ever." 

He  got  up  and  stood  looking  at  Belle  with  a  gleam 
of  such  intense  satisfaction  in  his  eyes  that  she  guessed 
what  he  had  done. 


LIFE 


315 


"  That's  our  admirable  friend  Kenyon,"  he  added. 
'  That's  the  man  who  shared  rooms  with  Peter  — 
whose  charm  of  manner  got  us  all  at  Oxford,  and  who 
was  made  one  of  the  family  by  father  and  mother 
when  he  came  to  this  country.  I  hit  him  for  Peter, 
for  you  and  for  myself  in  that  glorious  ten  minutes 
to-day.  I  left  him  lying  on  the  floor  in  his  rooms 
all  over  his  own  black  blood,  and  if  ever  I  meet  him 
again,  in  any  part  of  the  world,  at  any  time  of  my  life, 
I'll  give  him  another  dose  of  the  same  sort  —  for  Peter, 
for  you  and  for  me —  That's  what  I  came  to  tell 
you,  Bee." 

He  bent  forward  and  kissed  her,  turned  round  and 
left  the  room. 

That  was  Kenyon,  Graham  had  said. 

Standing  where  he  had  left  her,  with  this  story  of 
utter  and  incredible  treachery  in  her  ears,  Belle  added 
another  count  to  Graham's  indictment, —  that  of  try- 
ing to  seduce  her  without  even  the  promise  of  mar- 
riage, when  her  grief  at  parting  with  him  made  her 
weak. 

For  a  moment  she  stood  chilled  and  stunned.  That 
was  Kenyon  —  All  along  she  had  been  fooled  —  all 
along  he  had  been  playing  with  her  as  though  she 
amounted  merely  to  a  light  creature  with  whom  men 
passed  the  time.  It  was  due  to  her  father, —  of  all 
men,  her  father, —  that  she  stood  there  that  night, 
humiliated  but  unharmed,  with  her  pride  all  slashed 
and  bleeding,  her  self-respect  at  a  discount,  but  with 
nothing  on  her  conscience  that  would  make  her  face 
the  passing  days  with  fear  and  horror. 


316        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

She  suddenly  flamed  into  action.  "  Yes ;  that's 
Kenyon!  "  she  thought,  and  making  a  sort  of  blazing 
pounce  on  the  middle  drawer  of  her  dressing-table  she 
pulled  it  open,  took  out  the  large  photograph  of  a  man 
in  hunting-kit,  and  with  queer,  choking  cries  of  rage 
and  scorn,  tore  it  into  shreds  and  stamped  upon  the 
pieces. 

XVI 

BELIE  got  very  little  sleep  that  night.  Having 
finally  decided,  on  top  of  her  talk  with  Graham,  that 
Kenyon  had  intended  to  treat  her  much  in  the  same 
way  as  he  had  treated  Peter,  she  endeavored  to  look 
back  honestly  and  squarely  at  the  whole  time  dur- 
ing which  that  super-individualist  had  occupied  her 
thoughts.  She  saw  herself  as  a  very  foolish,  naive 
girl,  without  balance,  without  reserve  and  without 
the  necessary  caution  in  her  treatment  of  men  which 
should  come  from  proper  training  and  proper  ad- 
vice. 

She  laid  no  blame  upon  her  mother, —  that  excel- 
lent little  woman  whose  God-sent  optimism  made  her 
believe  that  all  her  children  were  without  flaw  and 
that  the  world  was  full  of  people  with  good  hearts 
and  good  intentions.  She  blamed  only  herself,  and 
saw  plainly  enough  that  she  had  allowed  her  head  to 
be  turned  by  her  father's  sudden  acquisition  of  wealth 
which  made  it  unnecessary  for  her  to  be  anything  more 
than  a  sort  of  butterfly  skimming  lightly  through  life 
without  any  duties  to  perform  —  without  any  work 


LIFE  317 

to  occupy  her  attention  —  without  any  hobbies  to  fill 
her  mind  and  give  her  ambition.  She  felt  like  some 
one  who  had  just  escaped  from  being  run  over  in  the 
streets,  or  who,  by  some  divine  accident,  had  been 
turned  back  from  the  very  edge  of  an  abyss.  It  was 
indeed  a  night  that  she  could  never  forget  in  all  her 
life.  She  lay  in  bed  in  the  dark  room  with  her  eyes 
wide  open,  hearing  all  the  hours  strike  one  by  one, 
watching  herself  with  a  sort  of  terror  and  amazement 
passing  through  Oxford.  All  the  incidents  that  had 
been  crowded  into  that  short  and  what  had  appeared 
to  be  glorious  week,  came  up  in  front  of  her  again,  es- 
pecially the  incident  in  the  back-water  with  Kenyon  and 
the  night  of  the  ball  at  Wadham  College.  These  were 
followed  in  her  mind  by  the  scene  in  the  library  in  her 
father's  house,  and  finally  that  dangerous  hour  in 
Kenyon's  rooms  when,  but  for  the  intervention  of  that 
man  who  seemed  of  so  little  account,  she  might  have 
been  placed  among  those  unfortunate  girls  of  whom 
the  world  talks  very  harshly  and  who  pay  a  terrible 
price  for  their  foolishness  and  ignorance.  And  when 
finally  she  got  up,  tired-eyed  but  saner  than  she  had 
been  since  those  good,  strenuous  days  of  hers  at  her 
college  when  she  had  intended  to  make  art  her  mis- 
sion in  life,  she  told  herself  with  a  characteristic  touch 
of  humour  that  the  reformed  criminal  was  a  very  good 
hand  at  preaching,  and  made  up  her  mind  to  go  along 
to  Ethel  and  improve  the  occasion.  It  was  very  ob- 
vious to  her  that  if  she  did  not  do  this  nobody  would, 
and  she  was  eager  to  give  a  sort  of  proof  of  the  fact 
that  she  was  grateful  for  her  own  escape  by  giving 


318        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

her  young  sister  the  benefit  of  her  suffering.  And 
so  she  put  on  her  dressing-gown  and  went  to  her  sis- 
ter's room  —  the  little  sister  of  whom  she  was  so  fond 
and  proud. 

Ethel  was  sitting  at  her  dressing-table  doing  her 
hair.  There  was  a  petulant  and  discontented  expres- 
sion on  her  face.  Still  shamming  illness,  she  had  not 
yet  recovered  from  the  smart  of  what  she  called  Jack's 
impertinence.  There  was  a  surprise  in  store  for  her, 
—  she  who  believed  that  she  had  managed  so  success- 
fully to  play  the  ostrich. 

"Why,  Belle!"  she  said.  "What's  the  matter? 
You  look  as  though  you  had  been  in  a  railway  acci- 
dent." 

Belle  sat  down,  not  quite  sure  how  she  would  begin 
or  of  the  sort  of  reception  that  she  would  receive. 
She  always  felt  rather  uncouth  in  the  presence  of  this 
calm,  self-assured,  highly  finished  little  sister  of  hers. 
"  Well,"  she  said,  "  I  have  been  through  a  sort  of 
railway  accident  and  a  good  many  of  my  bones  seem 
to  have  been  broken, —  that's  why  I'm  here.  I  want 
to  stop  you,  if  I  can,  from  going  into  the  same 
train." 

"  I  don't  think  I  quite  understand  you." 

"  I  don't  suppose  you  do,  my  dear,  but  you  shall  — 
believe  me."  And  then,  in  the  plainest  English  she 
gave  Ethel  the  story  of  her  relations  with  Kenyon, 
without  in  any  way  sparing  herself.  And  when  she 
came  to  the  parting  scene  in  Kenyon's  rooms  she 
painted  a  picture  that  was  so  strong  and  vivid  —  so  ap- 
palling in  its  proof  of  foolishness,  that  she  made  even 


LIFE  319 

Ethel  forget  her  complacency  and  sit  with  large,  fright- 
ened eyes. 

Then  she  got  up  and  began  to  walk  about.  "  I'm 
not  a  fool,"  she  said,  "  and  this  thing  is  going  to  teach 
me  something.  Also,  I'm  not  a  coward  and  I've  told 
you  all  this  for  a  reason.  You  think  that  you're  a  very 
wise  little  person,  kiddie,  but  in  reality  you're  no  bet- 
ter than  I  am,  and  just  as  sentimental  and  every  bit 
as  unwatched  and  as  resentful  of  guidance.  Why  are 
you  here  instead  of  being  at  school?  You  think  no 
one  knows  that.  Well,  I  do.  You're  playing  ducks 
and  drakes  with  mother  and  father  and  your  educa- 
tion in  order  to  have  what  we  call  a  '  good  time.' 
You  have  shammed  sickness  so  that  you  could  have 
an  adventure  with  the  boy  next  door." 

"  How  d'you  know  that?  "  cried  Ethel. 

"  Easily  enough,  my  dear.  I  was  told  by  the  girl 
who  used  to  bring  your  thermos  up  to  this  room  and 
who  had  caught  you  with  the  boy.  Two  days  ago  she 
left  to  be  married,  but  before  she  went  she  blurted 
out  the  whole  story.  It  wasn't  for  me  to  interfere 
then.  I  didn't  much  care,  to  tell  the  truth, —  in  fact, 
I  thought  it  was  rather  a  good  joke.  I  rather  ad- 
mired you  for  the  cunning  way  in  which  you  had  ar- 
ranged everything.  I  thought  you  were  a  good  sport. 
I  don't  know  how  far  it  has  gone,  but  I  hope  to  Heaven 
that  you've  not  been  quite  so  insane  as  I  was.  I'm 
not  going  to  tell  mother  or  do  the  elder  sister  stunt, 
or  anything  of  that  sort.  I'm  just  going  to  ask  you  to 
chuck  it  all  and  go  back  to  school  and  play  the  game 
for  a  change,  and  to  try  to  bear  in  mind  that  you  owe 


320        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

father  and  mother  something, —  a  thing  we  all  seem 
to  have  forgotten, —  and  when  you  do  go  back,  just 
remember  —  and  always  remember  —  what  I've  told 
you  about  myself.  We're  very  much  alone,  you  and 
I, —  like  two  girls  who  are  staying  in  a  house  with 
somebody  else's  father  and  mother, —  and  so  let's  help 
each  other  and  get  a  little  honesty  and  self-respect 
and  see  things  straight.  What  d'you  say,  dear  little 
sister?" 

Ethel  got  up,  and  with  a  complete  breakdown  of  all 
the  artificiality  so  carefully  instilled  into  her  by  her 
fashionable  school,  slipped  into  her  sister's  arms  and 
burst  out  crying. 

XVII 

IT  was  not  until  the  next  afternoon  that  Peter  was 
allowed  to  get  up.  His  superb  constitution  had  stood, 
rock-like,  against  the  chill  which  the  doctor's  medicine 
had  helped  to  throw  off.  He  had  done  full  justice 
to  a  broiled  chicken  which  Nellie  Pope  had  cooked 
for  him ;  but  when,  having  put  on  his  clothes,  he  stood 
in  front  of  the  looking-glass,  he  felt  as  though  he  had 
been  under  a  steam-roller  and  flattened  out. 

"  Good  Lord ! "  he  said,  when  he  saw  his  pale,  un- 
shaven face.  "  Good  Lord ! "  But  he  was  very 
happy.  He  had  read  and  re-read  Ranken  Townsend's 
generous  apology.  Betty  was  waiting  for  him  — 
thank  God  for  that. 

And  then  he  began  to  look  round.  Was  this  a 
nursing  home?  The  dressing-table,  with  its  tins  of 


LIFE  321 

powder  and  a  large  dilapidated  puff,  its  red  stuff  for 
lips,  its  shabby  little  brushes  and  a  comb  with  several 
of  its  teeth  gone,  looked  as  though  it  belonged  to  a 
woman, —  poor  and  struggling.  The  door  of  the 
closet,  which  gaped  a  little,  showed  dresses  hanging 
and  a  pair  of  very  high-heeled  boots  with  white  up- 
pers. He  opened  a  drawer  in  the  dressing-table.  It 
was  full  of  soiled  white  gloves,  several  veils  neatly 
rolled  up,  and  a  collection  of  small  handkerchiefs.  A 
strong,  pungent  scent  rose  up  from  them. 

An  ugly  suspicion  crept  slowly  into  his  mind.  He 
looked  at  the  bed  with  its  frilled  pillows,  at  the  flower 
papered  bare  walls,  at  the  rather  worn  blue  carpet,  at 
the  flimsy  wrap  hanging  limply  on  a  peg  on  the  door 
of  the  bath-room,  at  the  little  bed-room  slippers  tucked 
away  beneath  one  of  the  white,  painted  chairs 

He  turned  and  called  out :     "  Nurse !     Nurse !  " 

Something  in  his  tone  brought  Nellie  Pope  in  quickly. 

He  was  standing  with  his  hand  on  the  big  brass 
knob  of  the  bed.  "  You  told  me  that  this  was  a  nurs- 
ing home,"  he  said. 

The  girl  laughed.  How  should  she  know  what 
Peter  had  done  with  his  life  —  of  the  ideal  that  he 
kept  so  steadily  in  front  of  him?  She  only  knew  the 
other  kind  of  men.  "  So  it  is,"  she  said.  "  It's  my 
home  and  I've  had  to  be  your  nurse.  Pretty  well 
put,  I  think.  Don't  you?  'Ow  d'you  feel,  dearie? 
A  bit  groggy  on  your  pins?  " 

The  girl's  cockney  accent,  her  made-up  face,  her 
cheap,  smart  clothes  were  noticed  by  him  for  the  first 
time.  Her  insinuating,  cheerful  manner  and  that 


322        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN  . 

sort  of  hail-fellow-well-met  intimacy  that  was  all  about 
her,  came  to  him  with  a  new  and  appalling  meaning. 
He  had  been  spoken  to  by  just  such  women  in  London 
after  dark,  and  on  Broadway  and  its  side  streets  as 
he  passed.  They  belonged  to  the  night  life  of  all 
great  cities.  They  were  the  moths  who  came  out 
attracted  by  the  glare  of  electric  light.  Good  God! 
What  was  he  doing  in  that  place  ? 

The  keen  remembrance  of  this  woman's  inestimable 
kindness,  the  supreme  lack  of  selfishness  which  had 
inspired  her  to  bend  so  frequently  over  his  bed,  tlie 
charity  of  her  treatment  of  him  as  he  lay  ill  and  help- 
less, made  him  anxious  above  everything  else  not  to 
hurt  her  feelings.  But  there  were  things  that  he  must 
know  at  once, —  urgent,  vital  things  which  might  affect 
all  the  rest  of  his  life.  There  was  Betty  his  love-girl 
—  the  girl  who  was  to  be  his  wife  —  who  was  waiting 
for  him  with  the  most  exquisite  and  whole-hearted 
trust 

"  I  want  you  to  tell  me  how  I  came  here,"  he  said. 

Nellie  Pope  went  over  to  the  dressing-table. 
"  That's  easy,"  she  replied  lightly,  adding  a  new  coat 
of  color  to  her  lips.  "  The  night  before  last,  not  hav- 
ing 'ad  any  luck,  I  was  'aving  a  last  look  round  and 
'appened  to  be  in  Forty-eighth  Street  just  as  you  stag- 
gered out  of  a  'ouse  on  the  arm  of  a  young  gent.  I 
reckoned  'e  didn't  'ave  any  use  for  me,  being  outside 
'is  own  place,  but'  I  passed  'im  the  usual  greetin'  from 
force  of  'abit,  just  as  'e  'ad  called  up  a  taxi.  With  a 
funny  look  on  'is  face, —  a  curly  smile  I  called  it  to 
meself, — 'e  suddenly  gave  me  orders,  lumped  you  into 


LIFE  323 

the  cab,  blind  to  the  wide,  and  told  me  to  get  in  and 
take  you  'ome,  and  'elp  meself  to  any  money  you  'ad 
on  you.  Well,  I  did,  and  the  next  instalment  of  the 
serial  you  know  as  well  as  I  do.  Feeling  weak,  old 
dear?" 

Peter  sat  heavily  on  the  foot  of  the  bed. 

Nellie  Pope  went  on, —  simply  and  naturally,  like 
one  who  is  glad  to  talk,  glad  to  hear  her  own  voice, 
indescribably,  pathetically  glad  to  be  in  the  company 
of  a  man  who  asked  for  nothing,  who  was  not  a  guest, 
but  a  friend  —  a  fellow-creature  down  on  his  luck. 
"  Me  and  Graham,"  she  said, — "  and,  I  say,  what  a 
good-looking  boy  that  is,  and  fairly  devoted  to  you, 
dearie, —  well,  'im  and  me  think  that  you  must  'ave 
done  something  to  get  the  goat  of  this  young  feller. 
'E  doped  you,  that's  certain,  and  then  passed  you  off 
on  me.  Enjoyed  the  joke,  as  it  were,  too,  according 
to  what  I  noticed.  Is  that  likely  ?  " 

Peter  didn't  answer.  The  joke — ?  Back  into  his 
mind  came  the  many  things  that  Kenyon  had  said  to 
him  at  Oxford :  "  You  need  humanizing,  old  boy. 
You  want  to  be  hauled  off  that  self-made  pedestal  of 
yours.  One  of  these  days  you'll  come  to  an  unholy 
crash — "  Back  into  his  mind  also  came  Kenyon's 
taunts  made  to  him  as  he  stood  with  his  back  to  the 
fireplace  in  the  library  the  night  after  they  had  returned 
from  having  seen  Ita  Strabosck :  "  You're  blind ! 
Blind !  I  tell  you,  and  in  that  room  sits  a  man  whose 
patients  you  may  become." 

Utterly  ignorant  of  the  feeling  of  revenge  which 
had  surged  through  Kenyon's  brain  after  Belle  had 


324        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

been  saved  by  the  Doctor,  it  was  borne  in  on  Peter,  as 
he  sat  on  the  bed  of  this  poor  little  night-bird,  that  Ken- 
yon  had  set  out  on  purpose  —  with  calculated  delibera- 
tion—  to  make  him  human,  as  he  called  it,  before  he 
returned  to  England.  He  had  made  him  drunk  in 
order  to  carry  out  the  joke.  He  had  given  him  some- 
thing to  render  him  insensible,  well  knowing  that  in 
no  other  way  could  this  fiendish  desire  be  fulfilled. 

"What  time  is  my  brother  coming?"  he  asked. 

Nellie  Pope  was  busy  daubing  powder  on  her  face. 
"  Not  until  about  nine  o'clock,"  she  said.  "  'E  and 
me  talked  it  over  this  morning.  The  idea  is  that  you're 
coming  in  on  the  train  that  arrives  at  the  Grand  Cen- 
tral at  eight- forty-five.  Now  don't  forget  this.  You 
stayed  the  night  in  your  friend's  apartment,  but  you 
couldn't  see  'im  off  the  next  morning  because  you'd 
taken  on  a  bit  of  business  for  'im  which  meant  going 
out  of  town.  Your  brother  is  going  to  meet  you  at 
the  station.  That's  the  story.  And  you're  going 
'ome  together.  'E  went  back  to  get  one  of  your  bags. 
'E  will  sneak  it  out  of  the  'ouse  and  bring  it  round  here. 
Oh,  I  think  we're  pretty  good  stage  managers,  'im  and 
me.  You  see,  the  notion  is  that  Ma  mustn't  be  upset. 
Poor  little  Ma !  " 

"  What's  to-day  ?  "  asked  Peter,  whose  whole  body 
seemed  suddenly  to  have  been  frozen. 

"  Sunday,  dearie." 

"  Then  I've  been  here  two  nights  ?  " 

"  That's  so,"  said  the  girl. 

Peter  was  consumed  with  a  desire  to  explore  the 
apartment.  He  wanted  to  discover  whether  there  was 


LIFE  325 

another  bedroom.     "Are  you  comfortable  here?"  he 
asked,  a  little  clumsily. 

Nellie  Pope  was  rather  flattered  at  his  interest  and 
so  genuinely  delighted  to  see  this  great  big  man-boy 
on  his  feet  again  that  she  could  have  broken  into  a 
dance.  "  Come  and  'ave  a  look  at  my  suite,"  she  said, 
laughing  at  the  word  she  chose.  "  You  know  the 
bedroom, —  I  don't  think  you'll  forget  that  in  a 
'urry.  On  the  right  I  'ave  the  sitting-room  which  I 
only  use  for  my  customers,  preferring  to  sit  in  the 
kitchen,  which  we  now  come  to."  She  led  him  into 
it,  with  her  hand  on  his  arm  —  she  was  apeing  the 
manner  and  the  phraseology  of  the  guide.  '"  In  this 
bright  little  apartment,  beautifully  furnished  with  a 
gas  stove  and  dresser  —  not  exactly  Jacobean  —  a 
plain,  but  serviceable  Deal  table  and  a  nice  piece  of 
linoleum  which  'as  worn  very  well,  the  sometimes 
popular  Miss  Nellie  Pope  passes  most  of  'er  leisure. 
'Ere  she  cooks  her  own  meals  and  washes  up  after 
'erself, —  she's  a  very  neat  little  thing, —  and  before 
going  out  on  the  long  trail  in  all  weathers,  reads  about 
life  with  a  big  L  in  the  magazines,  in  which  'eroes 
with  curly  'air,  who  stand  about  six-feet-six,  make 
'onest  love  to  blondes  with  'eads  like  birds'  nests,  who 
are  nearly  always  about  six-feet-one,  and  never  fail 
to  wear  silk  stockings, —  and  there  you  'ave  it.  A 
charming  suite  for  a  single  lady  who  earns  'er  own  liv- 
ing. The  only  drawback  to  it  is  that  the  rent  'as  to 
be  paid  monthly  in  advance,  and  the  blighter  who  col- 
lects it  gives  no  grace.  This  is  the  sort  of  thing: 
'  Say !  Got  that  rent? '  '  Well  — '  '  Come  on  now, 


326        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

ain't  got  no  time  to  waste  here.  Pay  up  or  get 
out — '  I  tell  you  what  it  is,  dearie,  there's  a  little 
Florida  in  Hell  for  them  men  who  let  out  apartments 
to  us  girls,  and  the  heat  there  is  something  intense." 
She  laughed,  but  there  was  a  curious  quiver  to  it. 

Behind  all  her  badinage  and  cheery  pluck  Peter  could 
see  a  vein  of  terror  which  touched  his  sympathies. 
Poor  little  painted,  unfortunate  thing!  Was  there  no 
other  way  in  which  she  could  live  and  keep  her  head 
above  water?  He  sat  down  and  leaned  on  the  table 
with  his  elbows.  "  Will  you  tell  me,"  he  said,  "  what 
brought  you  to  this  ?  " 

"  Brought  me  to  it  ? "  Nellie  Pope  shot  out  a 
laugh.  "You  dear,  funny  old  thing!"  she  said. 
"  Nothing  brought  me  it.  I  chose  it." 

"  Chose  it !     Chose  this?  " 

"  Yes,  this !  A  great  many  of  us  choose  it.  It's 
the  easiest  way.  That  shocks  yer,  doesn't  it, —  you 
who  come  from  a  comfortable  home  and  whose  sis- 
ters 'ave  everything  they  want.  But,  you  listen  to 
this  and  don't  be  too  fast  to  pass  judgment.  I  was 
one  of  a  big  brood  of  unnecessary  kids.  My  father 
earned  fourteen  shillings  a  week  by  grubbing  in  the 
earth  from  daybreak  till  sundown  and  my  mother 
took  in  washing.  We  lived  perched  up  on  a  'ill  among 
a  dozen  dirty  little  cottages.  What  was  the  outlook 
for  me?  Being  dragged  up  with  meat  once  a  week 
and  as  a  maid-of-all-work  down  in  the  town,  being 
ordered  about  by  a  drab  of  a  tradesman's  wife,  with 
not  enough  wages  to  buy  a  new  'at  and  a  little  bit  of 
finery  for  Sundays,  and  then  be  married  to  a  lout  who 


LIFE 


327 


got  drunk  regularly  every  Saturday  night  and  made 
me  what  mother  was, —  a  dragged,  anaemic,  dull  ani- 
mal woman,  working  up  to  the  time  I  'ad  a  baby  and 
working  directly  afterwards, —  no  colour,  no  lights, 
no  rush  and  bustle,  no  decent  clothes  to  put  on,  no  in- 
dependence. Yes,  I  chose  it,  and  if  I  'ad  my  time  over 
again  I  should  choose  it  again.  See!  It's  the  easiest 
way.  Oh,  yes,  we  die  young  and  nobody  knows  where 
we're  buried,  but  we've  'ad  our  day,  and  it's  the  day 
that  every  woman  fights  for,  the  same  as  every  man. 
Oh,  by  the  way,  'ere's  your  purse !  "  She  pushed  it 
over  to  Peter. 

"  My  purse?"  he  said. 

'  Yes ;  don't  you  recognize  it  ?  It  hasn't  got  so  much 
in  it  as  it  'ad,  because  I  was  told  to  'elp  meself,  and 
I  did.  I  'ave  jotted  down  what  I  'ave  taken;  'ere's 
the  account."  She  held  out  a  piece  of  paper  on  which 
Peter  could  see  a  list  of  spendings,  which  included  a 
taxicab  fare  and  a  nickel  for  telephoning.  At  the  end 
of  it  there  was  an  item  entitled  "  Fee,  thirty  dollars." 

Peter  shuddered.  He  pushed  the  remainder  of  the 
money  back  to  her  across  the  table.  "  Please  keep  it," 
he  said. 

Nellie  Pope  laughed  again.  She  was  full  of  laugh- 
ter. "  I  hoped  you'd  say  that,"  she  said.  "  It'll  come 
in  mighty  useful." 

Peter  felt  in  his  pocket  and  took  out  his  cheque- 
book. He  looked  about  and  saw  a  bottle  of  ink  and  a 
pen  on  the  dresser,  with  a  piece  of  dilapidated  blue 
blotting-paper.  Watched  with  peculiar  interest  and 
excitement  by  Nellie  Pope,  he  got  up,  went  over  to  the 


328        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

dresser  and  wrote  a  cheque.  "  Will  you  accept  this?  " 
he  asked.  "  I  wish  I  could  make  it  larger.  But  if 
it  was  ten  times  the  amount  it  couldn't  possibly  cover, 
my  gratitude  to  you.  You've  been  awfully  kind  to 
me.  Thank  you,  Nellie."  He  held  it  out. 

The  girl  took  it  and  gave  a  little  cry.  "  Five  hun- 
dred dollars!  Oh,  Gawd!  I  didn't  know  that  there 
was  so  much  money  in  the  world."  She  burst  into 
tears,  but  went  on  talking.  "  Mostly  I  can't  afford  to 
cry,  because  it  washes  the  paint  off  my  face,  and  it's 
very  expensive.  But  what  do  I  care,  with  this  bloom- 
ing cheque  in  my  'and  ?  I  shall  be  able  to  take  a  little 
'oliday  from  business  and,  my  word,  that's  a  treat. 
God  makes  one  or  two  gentlemen  from  time  to  time, 
'pon  my  soul  he  does.  Put  it  there,  Peter."  She  held 
out  her  hand  with  immense  cordiality  and  gratitude, 
and  Peter  took  it  warmly. 

But  he  had  discovered  what  he  wanted  to  know. 
There  was  only  one  bed  in  that  apartment,  and  back 
into  his  mind  came  Kenyon's  words.  "  Blind !  Blind ! 
—  both  of  you  —  and  in  that  room  sits  a  man  whose 
patients  you  may  become." 


XVIII 

GRAHAM  was  before  his  time.  He  hurried  in,  as 
anxious  to  get  Peter  out  of  that  apartment  as  Peter  was 
to  go.  He  found  his  brother  sitting  on  one  side  of  the 
kitchen  table  and  Nellie  Pope  on  the  other.  Both 
had  magazines.  The  girl  tore  herself  out  of  the  mar- 


LIFE 


329 


ble  house  of  the  heroine's  father  with  reluctance. 
Peter  had  been  holding  his  magazine  upside  down  for 
an  hour.  He  had  been  looking  right  through  it  and 
into  his  father's  laboratory.  There  was  not  even  the 
remote  suggestion  of  a  smile  on  his  pale  face  when 
Graham  threw  open  the  door. 

"  Come  on,  old  man,"  urged  Graham.  "  The  taxi's 
waiting." 

Peter  got  up.  "Well,  good-bye,  Nellie,"  he  said. 
"  I'll  come  and  see  you  soon." 

The  girl  darted  a  quick  look  at  him.  She  saw  that 
she  was  mistaken.  "  Oh,  yes,  that'll  be  very  kind  of 
you.  I  'aven't  got  any  friends." 

"  Yes  you  have,"  said  Graham, — "  two." 

Nellie  Pope  led  the  way  into  the  narrow  passage, 
stood  on  tiptoe,  made  a  long  arm  and  got  Peter's  hat 
off  the  peg.  Then  she  stood  in  front  of  him  and  her 
lips  trembled,  although  her  well-practised  smile  curled 
up  the  corners  of  her  mouth.  "  Not  good-bye,  but  ore- 
voy,  eh  ?  Well,  good  luck  and  God  bless  you.  I  shall 
miss  you  both  most  awfully.  It's  been  a  fair  treat  to 
'ave  you  'ere." 

Peter  waved  his  hand  and  went  down  the  bare  stairs. 
His  knees  felt  weak  and  shaky  and  his  eyes  seemed 
to  be  at  the  back  of  his  head.  He  drew  back  to  let  a 
woman  pass.  She  cocked  her  golden  head  at  him  with 
an  enquiring  eye  and  a  flash  of  teeth  and  pushed  open 
the  half-closed  door  of  an  apartment.  Her  high- 
pitched  metallic  voice  rang  out.  "  Say,  Kid,  there 
goes  Nellie  Pope's  boarder.  By  Gosh,  don't  yer  think 
some  one  oughter  stop  her  ?  " 


330        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

The  two  boys  drove  home  in  silence.  They  had 
both  caught  the  meaning  of  those  significant  words. 

Graham,  the  self -imagined  man  of  the  world,  who 
had  picked  up  a  large  collection  of  half- facts  —  as  all 
the  precocious  do  —  but  who,  for  all  that,  or  in  spite 
of  that,  had  walked  into  the  trap  set  by  Ita  Strabosck 
without  the  faintest  perception  of  his  danger,  threw 
those  words  aside.  Everything  would  be  right,  he 
told  himself,  and  if  he  had  been  coming  out  of  Nellie 
Pope's  apartment  in  the  ordinary  way  and  had  over- 
heard her  rival's  loud  comment,  he  would  simply  have 
shrugged  his  shoulders,  like  the  rest  of  the  young  men 
of  his  type  and  spirit,  and  knowing  only  the  tail  end  of 
the  truth,  told  himself  that  all  men  take  "  chances  " 
and  that  the  odds  were  largely  in  his  favor.  And 
what  would  this  attitude  of  puerile  bravado  have 
proved?  That  he  and  all  the  men  like  him  were  just 
as  much  a  menace  to  society  from  knowing  the  half- 
facts  which  did  nothing  more  for  them  than  allow 
them  to  take  "  chances,"  as  the  men  who  were  wholly 
ignorant  and  so  blundered  blindly  into  tragedy. 

To  Peter,  the  words  of  the  painted  woman  came  as 
a  finishing  blow.  In  his  crass  and  culpable  ignorance, 
into  which  Kenyon  had  flung  one  most  terrific  fact, 
he  came  away  from  Nellie  Pope  not  knowing  whether 
he  was  immune  —  not  able  to  assure  himself  that  he 
was  safe.  Think  of  it!  Big  and  strong  as  he  was, 
he  remained  a  mere  child  in  the  matter  of  plain,  nec- 
essary and  urgent  truths,  and  if  ever  a  man  knew  him- 
self for  a  fool  he  was  Peter  Guthrie,  as  he  drove  home. 

No  less  grateful  to  God  than  ever  for  having  been 


LIFE  331 

assisted  to  go  through  Harvard  and  Oxford  clean  and 
straight,  he  cursed  himself  for  not  having  sought  out 
the  facts  of  life, —  not  from  grinning  and  salacious 
arguments  of  half-informed  young  men,  but  from  a 
proper  source, —  since  his  father  had  not  conceived 
it  to  be  his  duty  to  give  them  to  him  early  in  his  life. 
If  Kenyon  had  not  opened  out  a  new  and  awful  vista 
of  thought  the  night  that  he  talked  about  Graham  and 
Ita  Strabosck,  Peter's  ignorance,  so  jealously  and  mis- 
takenly preserved,  would  have  remained  so  colossal  that 
he  would  have  gone  home  humiliated,  but  unworried. 
As  it  was,  this  one  thing  at  any  rate  —  this  one  most 
awful  thing  —  had  sunk  into  his  mind,  making  him 
dangerously  less  ignorant  but  without  proper  knowl- 
edge. He  arrived  home  a  prey,  therefore,  to  the  most 
hideous  fear. 

Luckily  there  were  people  dining  with  his  father 
and  mother.  Belle  had  gone  out  of  town  for  several 
days,  suffering  from  the  shock  of  finding  out  the  truth 
about  Kenyon,  and  Ethel  had  returned  to  school. 
Peter  ^.vas  able  to  go  up  to  his  own  room  unnoticed. 

Graham,  whose  loyalty  and  concern  had  been  good  to 
see,  went  up  with  him  and  threw  the  suit-case  into  a 
corner. 

"Gee!"  he  said,  with  a  touch  of  emotion  that  he 
made  no  attempt  to  hide,  "  but  I'm  glad  you're  home, 
Petey."  It  was  many  years  since  he  had  called  Peter 
by  the  name  that  he  had  gone  by  in  the  nursery.  He 
seemed  to  have  come  so  close  to  his  big  brother  dur- 
ing those  recent  hours. 

Peter  did  a  surprising  thing.     He  turned  quickly, 


332        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

strode  over  to  Graham,  put  his  arm  round  his  shoulder 
and  kissed  his  cheek.  For  just  those  few  moments 
both  men  had  gone  back  through  the  years  and  were 
little  boys  again. 

Two  things  happened  to  Graham.  He  blushed  to 
the  roots  of  his  hair,  and  swallowed  something  that 
threatened  to  choke  him. 

"  You  said  you  had  something  on,  didn't  you, — 
supper,  or  something  ?  "  said  Peter. 

"  Yes;  but  I'll  cut  it  out  if  you  want  me  to/' 

"  No,  don't.  Why  should  you  ?  I  feel  pretty  rot- 
ten and  I  shall  turn  in  right  away.  Don't  bother  about 
me  any  more,  old  man." 

"  I'd  rather  stay  with  you." 

"  Yes,  I  know  you  would,  old  boy,  but  you  push 
off  and  have  a  good  time.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I 
rather  want  to  —  to  be  alone  for  a  bit.  D'you  see  ?  " 

"  All  right,  then."  And  to  show  that  he  had  become 
a  man  again  and  his  own  master,  Graham  went  off 
whistling  the  latest  tango. 

And  by  letting  his  brother  go  at  that  moment,  Peter 
did  a  very  unwise  thing.  He  was  still  weak  and  ill. 
His  brain,  which  had  not  recovered  itself  from  the 
effects  of  Kenyon's  poisonous  mixture,  was  in  no  con- 
dition to  be  tortured  by  solitary  thought.  He  needed 
to  be  kept  away  from  self -analysis  —  to  be  set  to  work 
on  the  ordinary  commonplaces  of  everyday  life.  Most 
of  all,  his  thoughts  required  to  be  put  to  rest  by  sleep. 

Left  to  himself,  Peter  sat  down,  almost  in  the  dark, 
with  his  arms  folded,  his  legs  stuck  out  and  his  chin 
buried  in  his  chest,  and  thrashed  the  tired  machinery 


LIFE       ,  333 

of  his  brain  into  action.  All  that  had  happened  in 
the  last  forty-eight  hours  coming  on  top  of  the  suf- 
fering that  he  had  undergone  through  having  been 
separated  from  Betty  and  having  failed  to  bring  about 
the  new  relationship  with  his  father,  upon  which  he 
had  set  his  heart,  gradually  became  distorted.  He  be- 
gan to  look  at  everything  through  an  enormous  mag- 
nifying glass  and  to  see  himself,  not  as  one  whose 
loyal,  simple  and  unsuspicious  nature  had  been  taken 
advantage  of  by  Kenyon,  but  as  a  common  drunken 
creature  who  had  had  to  be  lifted  into  a  cab  and  who 
had  spent  two  nights  in  the  apartment  of  a  woman 
of  the  street.  He  began  to  look  at  himself  with  so 
deep  a  humiliation  and  disgust  that  the  mere  thought 
of  his  ever  again  holding  Betty  in  his  arms  seemed 
outrageous.  And  having  by  stages,  made  conceivable 
by  the  condition  of  his  health  and  the  strain  that  had 
been  put  upon  him  by  all  the  things  that  had  happened 
since  his  return  from  England,  come  up  to  this  morbid 
and  hyperconscientious  point  in  his  self-condemnation, 
he  stood  up  suddenly,  obsessed  by  a  new  and  appal- 
ling thought.  He  said  to  himself :  "  I'm  not  only 
unworthy  of  Betty,  I'm  unclean,  and  so  unfit  to  live." 
And  having  seized  at  that  with  the  avidity  and  even 
triumph  that  comes  with  a  sudden  disorder  of  the  un- 
derstanding, he  began  to  dramatize  his  death  —  to  ask 
himself  how  to  make  it  most  effective.  And  then  his 
father  entered  his  thoughts.  "  Ah ! "  he  cried  in- 
wardly. "Father  —  it's  father  who  is  responsible  — 
it's  father  who  must  be  made  to  pay!  I'm  his  eldest 
son.  He's  very  proud  of  me.  He  shall  come  into  the 


334        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

room  to-night  in  which  he  spends  all  his  time  for  the 
benefit  of  other  men's  sons  and  find  the  one  he  neglected 
lying  dead  on  the  floor.  That's  it!  Now  I've  got  it! 
There's  a  hideous  irony  about  this  that'll  sink  even 
into  his  curious  mind.  I'd  like  to  be  able  to  see  his 
face  when  he  finds  me.  There'd  be  just  a  little  satis- 
faction in  that." 

If  only  Graham  could  have  come  back  at  that  mo- 
ment, or  the  little  mother  to  put  her  arms  round  that 
poor,  big,  over-sensitive,  uninitiated  lad  and  bring  him 
out  of  his  mental  dejection  with  her  love  and  warmth! 

There  was  a  revolver  somewhere  among  his  things. 
He  had  bought  it  when  he  went  camping  during  one 
of  his  vacations  from  Harvard.  He  hadn't  seen  it 
for  several  years.  With  feverish  haste  he  instituted 
a  search,  going  through  one  drawer  after  another, 
flinging  his  collars  and  socks  and  all  his  personal  things 
aside,  talking  in  a  half-whisper  to  himself,  until,  with 
a  little  cry  of  glee,  he  found  it  with  a  box  of  cartridges. 
And  then,  with  the  most  scrupulous  care  he  loaded  it, 
slipped  it  into  his  pocket  and  crept  out  of  the  room 
and  downstairs.  The  door  of  the  drawing-room  was 
ajar.  He  heard  laughter  and  the  intermingling  of 
voices,  heard  some  one  say  "  Good-bye."  He  dodged 
quickly  past,  through  the  library  and  into  the  room  in 
which  he  had  last  stood  with  his  hand  on  the  shaking 
shoulders  of  his  father.  He  would  give  him  some- 
thing to  weep  about  this  time, —  yes,  by  jove,  he  would ! 
He  would  make  him  wake  up  at  last  to  the  fact  that 
his  sons  were  human  beings  and  needed  to  be  treated 
as  such! 


LIFE 


335 


He  welcomed  the  fact  that  away  in  the  distance  a 
storm  had  broken  with  the  deep  artillery  of  thunder, 
and  that  already  heavy  rain  was  swishing  down  on  the 
city.  It  fitted  into  his  half-maddened  mood. 

He  shut  the  door.  He  walked  quickly  about  the 
room,  speculating  as  to  the  most  effective  place  to 
be  found  outstretched.  He  had  a  decision  and  then, 
so  that  there  might  be  no  loop-hole  for  his  father,  sat 
down  to  write  a  final  indictment. 

Time  fled  away.  He  covered  page  after  page  of 
note  paper,  pouring  out  all  his  soul,  making  a  great 
appeal  for  the  right  treatment  of  Graham  and  his  sis- 
ters, and  finally  signed  his  name,  having  scrawled  in 
his  large  round  writing,  "  This  is  my  protest." 

The  storm  had  come  nearer.  Outbursts  of  thunder 
rolled  over  the  house  followed  by  stabs  of  light- 
ning. 

He  then  deliberately  placed  himself  on  the  chosen 
spot,  cocked  the  trigger  and  put  the  cold  barrel  of  the 
revolver  to  his  temple. 

There  was  a  sort  of  scream. 

Peter  swung  round,  with  his  nerves  jangling  like 
a  wire  struck  suddenly  with  a  stick. 

There  stood  his  father,  unable  to  form  a  sentence, 
his  face  grey,  his  eyes  distended  and  his  arms  thrown 
out  in  front  of  him. 

XIX 

PETER  was  angry,  like  a  child  disturbed  just  at  the 
moment  when  he  was  planning  a  surprise. 


336        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Why  couldn't  you  have  come  in  five  minutes 
later  ?  "  he  cried  out,  with  queer  petulance. 

The  Doctor  tottered  forward  and  peered  into  his 
son's  face.  "  Why  were  you  going  to  do  that  ?  Tell 
me,  tell  me !  " 

"  You'd  have  found  it  all  there,"  said  Peter,  point- 
ing to  the  pages  which  he  had  left  on  the  desk.  "  Not 
very  nice  reading,  I  can  assure  you.  But  if  you 
want  me  to  tell  you  instead,  I  will.  And  then  you  can 
see  how  a  man  dies,  instead  of  finding  him  dead.  Per- 
haps this  is  the  best  way,  after  all." 

He  went  to  the  door  and  locked  it,  still  holding  the 
revolver.  The  sight  of  his  father  did  not  stir  any 
pity  or  sympathy  in  his  heart.  On  the  contrary,  it 
added  to  the  fever  that  had  attacked  his  brain  and  acted 
as  an  irritant.  He  went  back  and  stood  in  front  of 
the  grey  man.  There  was  an  expression  of  contempt 
on  his  altered  face.  The  pattering  of  heavy  rain 
against  the  windows  seemed  to  please  him.  Nature, 
like  himself,  seemed  to  have  burst  into  open  protest. 

"  Sit  down,"  he  said. 

The  Doctor  obeyed.  The  blaze  in  his  son's  eyes 
contradicted  his  unnatural  calmness.  He  had  to  deal 
with  temporary  madness.  He  could  see  that,  and  he 
was  chilled  with  a  sense  of  impending  danger  in  which 
the  most  poignant  solicitude  was  mixed. 

"  Now,"  said  Peter,  weighing  his  words  with  odd 
deliberation,  "  you're  going  to  hear  something  that'll 
shake  you  out  of  your  smug  self-complacency  and  your 
pitiful  belief  that  everything  is  all  right  in  this  house  — 
You're  a  good  man,  a  better  man  than  the  average 


LIFE 


337 


father.  There's  nothing  in  your  life  that  isn't  to  your 
credit.  Even  since  you  had  children  you've  worked 
like  a  dog  to  give  them  a  better  education  than  you 
had,  and  you've  gone  without  things  to  provide  us  with 
money  and  make  things  easy.  We  all  know  that  and 
we're  grateful.  We  all  know  that  we  ought  to  be 
proud  of  you  as  a  doctor  —  as  a  man  who  has  made 
discoveries  and  added  to  the  scientific  knowledge  of 
your  profession.  Well,  we  are  proud  of  you.  But 
in  the  last  words  that  you'll  hear  me  speak  I'm  going 
to  tell  you  what  you've  failed  to  do  and  why,  in  spite 
of  all  your  kindness  and  unselfishness,  not  one  of  your 
children  respects  you  or  loves  you,  and  why  I,  your 
eldest  son,  have  got  to  put  an  end  to  myself  because 
of  your  neglect." 

Dr.  Guthrie  sprang  to  his  feet.  The  calculated 
cruelty  of  this  indictment  was  more  than  he  could  en- 
dure. "What  does  this  mean?  If  you  don't  respect 
and  love  me,  the  others  do.  In  what  way  have  I  neg- 
lected you  ? "  He  stood  up  to  Peter  like  a  man, 
whipped  into  sudden  anger. 

Peter  liked  that.  It  meant  that  he  could  hit  out 
and  put  facts  into  naked  words  without  feeling  that 
he  was  ill-treating  a  weakling.  "  That's  what  I'm 
going  to  tell  you,"  he  said.  "  But  there's  lots  of  time 
and  I'm  not  going  to  leave  anything  out.  What  makes 
you  think  the  others  respect  and  love  you?  Do  they 
ever  tell  you  so?  Do  they  ever  tell  you  anything? 
Do  they  ever  go  out  of  their  way  to  come  in  here  for 
a  little  talk?  And  if  they  did  come  in  would  you  get 
out  of  your  shell  far  enough  for  them  to  see  that  you're 


338        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

a  human  being?  Would  you  meet  them  half-way  in 
their  desire  to  get  something  besides  your  money  from 
you  ?  Have  you  ever  once  in  your  life  been  sufficiently 
inspired  with  a  sense  of  your  responsibility  as  to  make 
you  get  up  and  leave  your  work  and  come  among  us 
to  play  with  our  toys  and  get  known  ?  Have  you  ever 
once  in  all  the  years  that  we've  been  growing  up  been 
courageous  or  wise  enough  to  take  Graham  or  me  for 
a  walk  and  tell  us  any  one  thing  that  we  ought  to 
know  ?  In  what  way  have  you  ever  neglected  us  ?  In 
the  most  vital  way  of  all.  We  could  have  done  with- 
out your  money  and  the  education  that  you've  been 
so  delighted  to  give  us.  We  could  have  done  without 
comfort  and  servants  and  good  food  and  easy  times. 
They  mean  nothing  in  the  sum  total  of  things  that 
count.  Most  men  never  have  them  at  the  beginning. 
They  make  them.  What  you've  never  given  us  is 
yourself.  And  we  needed  you.  What  you've  never 
given  us  is  common  sense.  You've  been  a  good  father 
in  every  inessential  way,  but  no  father  at  all  in  all  that 
goes  to  make  us  men.  You've  lived  in  a  fool's  para- 
dise. You've  let  us  find  our  own  way.  You've  not 
given  us  one  human  talk  —  one  simple  fact  —  one  word 
of  warning.  You've  utterly  neglected  us  because 
you're  a  coward  and  you've  hoped  and  trusted  that 
others  might  tell  us  what  you've  been  afraid  to  say. 
Afraid, —  to  your  own  flesh  and  blood, —  think  of  it !  " 
The  Doctor  cried  out  again.  He  realized  much  of 
the  truth  of  all  this.  He  had  confessed  himself  to  be 
painfully  shy  to  his  wife  many  times  and  had  spent 
God  knew  how  many  anxious  hours  wondering  how 


LIFE 


339 


he  could  get  to  know  his  boys.     But  it  was  too  much 
to  stand  and  be  whipped  by  his  son. 

'  There   are   thousands   of    fathers   who  hold  my 
views  and  act  as  I  have  acted,"  he  said. 

"  And  there  are  so  many  thousands  of  sons  who  have 
to  pay  for  those  views  that  you  and  men  like  you  spend 
your  lives  in  trying  to  save  them." 

The  Doctor  drew  in  his  breath.  "  Wh-what  d'you 
mean?  "  he  stammered. 

"  Ah !  that  gets  you,  doesn't  it  ?  Now  you're  begin- 
ning to  see  what  I'm  driving  at,  don't  you?  Put  your 
mind  back  to  the  night  you  found  Graham  here  with 
me.  You  saved  him  from  forging  your  name,  and 
that  was  good.  But  what  led  him  up  to  that?  Did 
you  ask  yourself?  Did  you  go  to  Graham  and  gain 
his  confidence?  Did  you  wonder  whether  there  was 
a  woman  behind  it  all  who  would  never  have  come  into 
his  life  if  you  had  dealt  by  him  like  a  man  and  a  fa- 
ther,—  the  sort  of  woman  who  has  made  necessary 
these  things  round  your  laboratory  and  caused  you 
to  bend  over  your  experiments  for  years  and  years  ?  " 

"  Good  God !     What  do  you  mean  ?  " 

Peter  raised  his  voice.  "  Why  should  your  sons  be 
immune?  What  have  you  ever  done  to  render  them 
so?  Why  am  I  now  standing  here  with  this  revolver 
in  my  hand?  Look  at  me!  A  few  hours  ago  I  had 
health  and  everything  in  the  world  that  makes  life 
worth  living,  except  a  father.  At  this  moment,  be- 
cause I've  never  had  a  father,  I'm  so  terrified  that  I 
should  be  a  criminal  if  I  married  the  girl  I  love  that 
I'm  going  to  kill  myself." 


340        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

"  Why?     What  have  you  done?  " 

"I've  been  two  nights  in  the  bed  of  the  sort  of 
woman  whose  work  you  are  trying  to  undo." 

The  Doctor  staggered,  and  then  rose  up  in  his 
wrath.  "  You  have  ?  You,  my  son, —  with  such  a 
mother  —  with  such  home  influence !  You  mean  to 
tell  me  that  you've  descended  to  such  depths  of  im- 
morality that  you've  gone  back  on  everything  that  your 
education  has  made  of  you?  It's  unthinkable  —  un- 
believable. You  must  be  a  mere  animal  to  have  done 
such  a  thing." 

What  else  he  would  have  said  in  his  emotion  and 
horror  no  one  can  say. 

A  cry  of  pain  and  rage  rang  out.  The  injustice  of 
his  father's  narrow,  inhuman  point  of  view,  his  in- 
ability to  show  him,  even  by  his  impending  death,  that 
he  must  wake  up  to  his  duty  and  stand  by  Graham 
and  his  sisters,  sent  the  blood  into  Peter's  fevered 
brain. 

"  My  God !  "  he  cried.  "  You  dare  to  talk  like  that 
to  me?  You  dare  to  kick  me  in  the  face  after  I've 
told  you  that  I'm  ignorant  —  without  listening  to  my 
explanation  as  to  how  I  got  into  that  woman's  apart- 
ment. All  right,  then,  I'm  not  going  to  be  the  only 
one  to  pay.  You  shall  take  your  share  of  it.  The 
sins  of  the  children  are  brought  about  by  the  neglect 
of  the  fathers,  and  we'll  go  and  stand  together  before 
the  Judge  to-night  for  a  verdict  on  that  count." 

He  raised  the  revolver,  aimed  it  at  his  father's  head, 
put  his  finger  on  the  trigger 

There  was  a  blinding  flash  of  lightning.     A  yellow 


34i 

quivering  flame  seemed  to  cut  the  room  in  half  between 
the  two  angry  men 

An  instant  later  the  Doctor  saw  Peter  standing  with 
both  hands  over  his  face.  The  unfired  revolver  lay  on 
the  table  in  all  its  ugliness.  And  presently,  when  he 
had  realized  what  had  happened,  he  went  nearer. 
"  God  didn't  intend  that  you  should  do  that,"  he  said. 
And  then  his  voice  broke  and  he  went  forward  to  put 
his  arms  round  Peter's  shoulders.  "  Give  me  another 
chance,  my  dearest  boy !  "  he  cried.  "  Give  me  another 
chance !  " 

But  before  he  could  reach  his  son  the  great  big  hurt 
boy  crumpled  and  fell  in  a  heap  at  his  feet. 


XX 

FOR  three  weeks  Peter's  bedroom  was  the  one  room 
in  the  house  to  which  the  eyes  of  all  the  family  were 
wholly  turned.  There,  in  the  dark,  he  lay  a  victim  to 
an  attack  of  brain  fever.  Never  in  a  condition  of 
great  danger,  poor  old  Peter  was  ill  and  the  Doctor, 
who,  better  than  the  rest,  knew  that  death  has  many 
doors  through  which  life  goes  out,  eyed  the  specialist 
who  had  been  called  in  with  pathetic  eagerness. 

The  little  mother  and  Belle  were  joined  at  once  by 
Betty,  and  the  three  women  sat  very  close  together, 
speaking  and  even  thinking  in  whispers  during  the  first 
two  days.  To  the  one  whose  first  child  he  was  and 
the  one  who  waited  to  be  his  wife,  Peter  meant  every- 
thing good  that  life  had  for  them,  and  in  their  terror 


342        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

that  he  might  be  taken  away  their  imaginations  ran 
ahead,  as  they  always  do  in  moments  of  such  poignant 
anxiety,  and  they  were  afraid  to  look  out  of  the  win- 
dow in  case  they  should  see  Death,  the  black  camel, 
kneeling  at  the  gate. 

While  the  shadow  seemed  to  rest  on  his  house,  Dr. 
Guthrie  did  many  things.  First  of  all  he  went  over  all 
the  terrible  words  that  Peter  had  said  to  him  that 
bad  and  unforgettable  night.  With  great  humbleness 
and  deep  emotion  he  accepted  them  as  the  truth.  He 
sat  for  hpurs  at  his  desk  with  his  hands  over  his  face 
and  tears  leaking  through  his  fingers.  Metaphorically 
he  placed  his  old  hard-working,  concentrated  self  in 
the  criminal  stand  and  his  new  startled,  humbled  and 
ashamed  self  in  the  Judge's  seat  and  summed  up  his 
life  as  a  father.  It  was  very  plain  that  he  had  failed 
in  his  duty  to  his  boys.  He  had  made  no  great  effort 
to  conquer  that  queer  shyness  which  had  affected  him 
from  the  beginning.  He  had  allowed  his  children  to 
grow  up  to  regard  him  as  Bluebeard.  He  had  thrown 
upon  his  wife's  slight  shoulders  all  the  onus  of  the 
responsibility  for  the  human  development  of  their 
characters,  and  because  she  had  succeeded  while  they 
were  young  he  had,  like  a  coward,  neglected  to  step  in 
and  take  upon  himself  his  obvious  duty  when  they  had 
grown  old  enough  to  need  more  —  much  more  —  than 
the  soft  guiding  hand  of  a  mother.  He  had  allowed 
them  to  make  an  early  start, —  the  girls,  as  well  as  the 
boys, —  without  understanding  the  vital  necessity  of 
duty  and  discipline  which  he  alone  could  inspire  in 
them,  because  no  man  or  woman  in  all  the  country, 


LIFE 


343 


in  any  school  or  college,  gave  a  single  thought  to  either. 
He  had  hidden  behind  a  hundred  weak  and  foolish  ex- 
cuses in  order  to  avoid  the  so-called  difficulties  of 
speaking  manfully  to  these  two  embryo  men.  He  had 
permitted  them  to  grow  out  of  boyhood  without  giving 
them  the  benefit  of  his  own  uninitiated  struggles,  or 
the  simple  warnings  and  facts  which  take  the  glamour 
away  from  temptation  and  make  straight  ways  easy. 
He  "  took  chances,"  and  hoped  that  some  one  else 
might  by  accident  give  them  the  facts  of  sex  or  that 
they  would  find  them  out  themselves,  as  other  young 
men  were  obliged  to  do, —  never  mind  how. 

Remorse  and  regret  made  Hell  for  this  man  in 
those  honest  hours, —  this  good,  exemplary,  distin- 
guished, self-made  man  whose  name  would  live 
by  his  professional  efforts  and  scientific  discoveries 
and  who  had  succeeded  in  everything  except  as  a 
father. 

And  then  he  called  Graham  into  his  room,  and  sit- 
ting knee  to  knee  with  his  second  son,  was  brave  enough 
to  tell  him  wherein  he  now  knew  that  he  had  failed  and 
asked  of  him,  as  he  had  asked  of  Peter,  for  another 
chance.  It  was  a  pathetic  and  emotional  talk  that 
these  two  had,  during  which  both  told  the  truth,  hiding 
nothing,  reserving  nothing.  The  outcome  of  it  was 
good  for  them  both,  as  well  as  for  Peter.  They  went 
together  to  see  Nellie  Pope  and  heard  from  her  lips, 
to  the  Doctor's  unspeakable  thankfulness,  that  Peter 
was  in  no  danger  from  her.  From  that  time  onwards 
that  little,  kind,  wretched  girl  became  one  of  the  Doc- 
tor's patients  in  the  proper  hospital,  eventually  to  be 


344        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

placed  by  him  at  work  which  rendered  the  need  for 
her  following  her  chosen  profession  unnecessary. 

And  finally  the  day  came  when  Peter  was  able  to 
receive  visitors,  and  a  very  good  day  it  was.  The  lit- 
tle mother  went  in  first  —  she  had  the  right.  Peter 
was  sitting  in  his  dressing-gown  by  the  window.  To 
his  intense  relief  he  had  just  passed  through  the  hands 
of  a  barber,  whom  he  had  asked  to  make  him  look  a 
little  less  like  a  poet.  He  turned  his  head  quickly  to- 
wards the  door  as  his  mother  went  in.  His  old  high 
spirits  had  returned.  The  sun  was  shining  and  life 
looked  very  good.  His  imagination  made  him  as  well 
aware  of  the  fact  that  his  mother  had  been  through 
some  of  the  most  anxious  hours  of  her  life  as  though 
he  had  seen  her  sitting  in  her  room  below  with  a  drawn 
white  face  and  her  hands  clasped  together.  He  got  up 
and  went  to  meet  her.  He  took  her  in  his  arms  and 
held  her  very  tight.  What  they  said  to  each  other  was 
far  too  sacred  to  put  into  cold  print.  They  spoke  in 
undertone,  because  the  trained  nurse  kept  a  jealous  eye 
upon  her  patient  and  moved  in  and  out  of  the  dressing- 
room  adjoining.  The  interview  was  not  allowed  to 
be  a  long  one.  The  last  thing  that  Peter  said  to  his 
mother  made  her  very  happy.  "  I  think  that  the  Gov- 
ernor and  I  are  pals,"  he  said.  "  I  think  we've  found 
each  other  at  last.  Isn't  that  just  about  the  best  thing 
you  ever  heard  ?  " 

In  the  afternoon  Belle  was  allowed  in.  To  his  great 
relief  she  told  him  in  her  characteristic,  concise  way, 
how  she  felt  about  Kenyon.  He  caught  her  young,  she 
?aid  —  marvellously  young,  "and  if  he  should  ever 


LIFE  345 

come  back  to  New  York  all  he'll  get  from  me  will  be 
two  fingers.  I've  quite  recovered.  So  you  may  take 
that  line  out  of  your  forehead,  old  boy.  One  of  these 
days  when  you're  out  and  about  again  we'll  walk  about 
four  times  round  the  reservoir  and  I'll  tell  you  some- 
thing of  what's  been  going  through  my  mind  while 
you've  been  ill.  In  fact,  we'll  have  a  very  substantial 
pow-wow  about  Nicholas  Kenyon,  and  I  don't  think 
we  shall  leave  him  quite  as  immaculate  as  he  usually 
is  by  the  time  we've  finished,  do  you?  " 

"No,"  said  Peter,  "I  don't.  All  the  same,  I'm 
grateful  to  him  for  one  thing.  He  has  brought  fa- 
ther out  of  his  shell, —  that's  about  the  best  thing  he 
ever  did  in  his  life." 

There  was  something  amusing  as  well  as  touching 
in  the  way  in  which  the  two  brothers  met  again.  It  was 
the  next  morning  early.  Peter  was  still  in  bed,  with 
his  hair  all  frowzled  and  the  remains  of  sleep  still  in 
the  corners  of  his  eyes.  Graham  had  ten  minutes 
before  he  was  obliged  to  leave  the  house  to  go  down- 
town. 

"  Hello,  old  sport !  "  said  Graham. 

"  Hello,  sonnie !  Rather  a  hot  thing  in  ties,  that, 
eh?" 

Graham  cleared  his  throat  and  put  his  hand  rather 
self-consciously  to  the  black-and-white  effect  newly 
designed  by  his  pet  firm  of  haberdashers.  "  I  think 
it'll  make  the  senior  partner  blink  all  right,"  he  said. 
"How  d'you  feel  this  morning?" 

Peter  showed  his  teeth.  "  I'm  sitting  up  and  tak- 
ing nourishment.  Probably  before  the  end  of  the 


346        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

week  you'll  see  me  in  shorts  and  a  zephyr  sprinting 
round  the  park  before  breakfast." 

"  I'd  like  to,"  said  Graham,  and  he  held  out  his 
hand. 

Peter  took  it  and  gave  it  a  scrunch  which  had  in 
it  nothing  of  the  invalid.  "  Give  my  love  to  the 
subway,"  he  said,  "  and  my  kind  regards  to  Wall 
Street'' 

Graham  grinned,  waved  his  hand  and  left  the  room. 
He  found  it  necessary  to  blow  his  nose  rather  hard  on 
his  way  down-stairs.  "  Oh,  Gee !  "  he  said  to  himself. 
"Oh,  Gee!  Only  think  if  Peter  had—"  He  didn't 
allow  himself  to  finish  the  thought. 

And  then  came  Betty,  and  the  way  in  which  she 
and  Peter  came  together  —  the  way  in  which  they 
stood  only  a  step  or  two  from  the  door,  inarticulate 
in  their  love  and  thankfulness,  was  too  much  even  for 
the  trained  nurse,  to  whom  love  and  death  and  the 
great  hereafter  were  mere  commonplaces.  She  with- 
drew to  the  dressing-room  and  stayed  there  for  a  whole 
solid  quarter-of-an-hour,  eliminating  herself  with  a 
tact  fulness  for  which  Peter  blessed  her  and  Betty  be- 
came her  friend  for  all  time. 

"  My  baby !  "  said  Peter.  "  We  shall  have  to  begin 
all  over  again.  We're  almost  strangers." 

But  Betty  shook  her  head.  "  No,"  she  said.  "  No. 
There  hasn't  been  one  moment  during  all  this  time  that 
I  haven't  been  with  you." 

And  Peter  nodded.     "  That's  dead  true,"  he  said. 

And  then  they  sat  down  very  close  together  and  the 
things  they  said  to  each  other  are  lost  to  the  world, 


LIFE  347 

because  we  joined  the  nurse  in  the  next  room  and  shut 
the  door. 


XXI 

IT  happened  that  the  anniversary  of  Doctor  and  Mrs. 
Guthrie's  wedding  day, —  they  had  been  married  twen- 
ty-eight years, —  fell  on  a  Sunday  that  year. 

The  night  before,  at  dinner,  the  little  mother,  thank- 
ful and  happy  at  having  Peter  back  again  at  the  table, 
asked  a  favour.  In  having  to  ask  it,  instead  of  sim- 
ply saying  that  she  desired  her  children  to  go  with  her 
to  church  the  next  morning,  she  proved  her  knowledge 
of  the  fact  that  she  had  joined  the  ranks  of  mothers 
whose  children  have  outgrown  them. 

Mrs.  Guthrie  was,  however,  one  of  those  rather  rare 
women  who  had  grown  old  gracefully.  The  hand  of 
time,  whose  natural  treatment  she  had  made  no 
sort  of  endeavor  to  combat,  had  added  to  her  beauty. 
Optimism,  a  steady  faith  in  God  and  His  goodness,  and 
the  usual  gift  of  accepting  whatever  came  to  her  with- 
out kicking  against  the  pricks,  had  mellowed  her.  It 
was  without  any  of  the  spirit  of  martyrdom  that 
cakes  the  nature  of  those  women  who  have  not  been 
able  to  acquire  the  best  sort  of  philosophy  that  she 
frankly  made  this  very  natural  and  easily  fulfilled  de- 
sire a  favour.  Peter  was  well  again  and  she  wanted  to 
kneel  before  the  altar  of  the  Great  Father  and  give 
thanks,  surrounded  by  her  children,  on  the  anniversary 
of  the  day  that  made  her  a  wife. 

The  family  had  grown  out  of  the  habit  of  going  to 


348        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

church, —  Belle  was  tired,  as  a  rule,  after  a  late  Satur- 
day night,  Graham  was  an  inveterate  week-ender, 
Ethel  was  a  modernist,  and  Peter  played  golf, —  and 
so,  when  they  all  agreed  without  any  argument  the  lit- 
tle mother  was  almost  as  surprised  as  she  was  de- 
lighted. 

The  conspiracy  of  silence  which  the  family  had 
tacitly  agreed  upon  during  their  recent  trouble,  in  or- 
der to  spare  her  from  unhappiness,  left  Mrs.  Guthrie 
wholly  without  any  knowledge  of  the  fact  that  they 
were  all  glad  of  an  excuse  to  join  her  in  church,  be- 
cause they  all  felt  a  curious  eagerness  to  listen  to  the 
simple,  beautiful  service  with  which  they  had  grown 
up  and  to  kneel  once  more  —  more  humbly  and  sin- 
cerely than  ever  before  —  in  the  house  of  the  God  who 
had  been  instrumental  in  their  various  escapes. 

It  would  have  been  better  if  Mrs.  Guthrie  had  not 
been  so  carefully  shielded  —  if  she  had  been  made  to 
share  with  the  Doctor  the  blame, —  at  any  rate  for  the 
mistakes  which  the  two  girls  had  made, —  from  the 
fact  that  she  had  let  go  the  reins  of  duty  and  discipline 
with  which  she  had  held  them  in  their  early  years  and 
given  them  their  heads  —  if  she  had  been  strong 
enough  and  wise  enough  to  maintain  over  Belle  and 
Ethel,  without  autocratically  putting  a  stop  to  their 
having  "  a  good  time,"  the  authority  of  respect,  won 
by  love  and  the  exercise  of  sympathy  and  common 
sense  —  if,  in  short,  she  had  not  been  content  to  slip 
into  a  position  that  allowed  these  high-spirited  girls 
to  say  to  themselves  quite  so  early  in  their  lives,  "  Oh, 
poor,  dear  little  mother  doesn't  understand.  She 


LIFE 


349 


doesn't  know  anything  that  modern  girls  have  to  go 
through."  She  was  shielded  because  it  was  under- 
stood that  she  was  a  sort  of  sleeping  partner  —  not 
an  active  member  of  the  firm.  She  was  regarded  as 
being  so  sweet  and  soft  and  old-fashioned  that  she 
couldn't  possibly  appreciate  the  conditions  of  the  times 
in  which  the  girls  lived.  Their  early  positions  had 
become  reversed.  It  was  the  girls  who  mothered  their 
mother. 

It  was  a  strangely  silent  party  that  returned  home 
that  Sunday  morning,  headed  by  the  Doctor  and  the 
little  mother.  Betty  had  been  invited  by  Mrs.  Guth- 
rie  to  join  them  and  was  to  stay  to  lunch.  It  was  while 
they  were  in  the  hall,  and  just  as  Betty  had  gone  up- 
stairs with  Mrs.  Guthrie,  that  the  Doctor  turned 
quickly.  "  I  want  you  all  to  come  to  my  room,"  he 
said.  "  I  won't  keep  you  more  than  a  few  moments," 
and  led  the  way. 

Wondering  what  was  going  to  happen,  but  taking 
trouble  to  avoid  catching  each  other's  eyes,  Peter, 
Graham,  Belle  and  Ethel  followed  their  father  across 
the  library  into  the  room  which,  for  the  two  boys,  had 
associations  that  they  were  never  likely  to  forget, 
and  for  the  two  girls  had  hitherto  been  a  place  to 
avoid. 

As  soon  as  they  were  in  the  room  the  Doctor  shut 
the  door  and,  from  force  of  habit,  went  over  to  his 
desk.  With  one  thin  hand  on  it,  and  with  a  shaft 
of  winter  sun  on  a  face  that  was  very  lined  and  pale 
he  stood  there  for  a  moment  in  silence.  His  lips  trem- 
bled a  little,  but  there  was  a  look  in  his  eyes  behind 


350        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

those  strong  glasses  that  his  children  had  never  seen 
before. 

"  Peter,  Graham,  Belle  and  my  little  Ethel,"  he  said 
brokenly,  "  I'm  going  to  ask  you  all,  on  a  day  that 
means  a  great  deal  to  your  mother  and  to  me,  and 
so  to  you,  to  forgive  me  for  not  having  been  all  that  I 
ought  to  have  been  to  you  I  know  that  I've  failed 
in  my  duty  as  a  father.  You  have  always  been  my 
most  precious  possessions  and  it  is  for  you  that  I've 
worked  so  hard  and  so  closely,  but  because  of  all  that 
I  went  through  as  a  child  and  because  I  never  strug- 
gled as  I  ought  to  have  done  to  overcome  a  foolish 
shyness  that  has  made  me  self-conscious,  you  and  I 
have  never  been  friends  —  have  never  understood  each 
other.  I  take  all  the  blame  for  whatever  you  have 
done  that  has  made  you  suffer  and  of  which  you  are 
ashamed.  Very  humbly,  I  stand  before  you  now  and 
ask  you,  as  I  asked  Peter,  here,  in  this  room,  to  give 
me  another  chance.  Let's  make  a  new  beginning  from 
to-day,  with  the  knowledge  that  I  love  you  better  than 
anything  in  the  world.  I  want  you  all  to  meet  me  half- 
way in  future,  to  look  upon  me  no  longer  as  the  shy, 
unsympathetic,  unapproachable  man  who,  by  accident, 
is  your  father,  but  as  your  closest  and  most  intimate 
friend  whose  best  and  dearest  wish  is  to  help  you  and 
listen  to  your  worries  and  give  you  all  the  advice  in 
his  power.  I  want  this  room  to  be  the  place  to  which 
you'll  always  come  with  the  certain  knowledge  that 
you'll  be  welcomed  by  me  with  the  greatest  eagerness 
and  delight.  Don't  let  there  be  anything  from  to-day 
onwards  that  you  can't  tell  me.  Promise  me  that.  I 


LIFE 

—  I've  told  myself  two  or  three  times  that  it's  too  late 
for  me  to  be  of  any  use  to  you  —  that  having  failed  I 
could  never  repair  my  mistake  or  ever  hope  to  win 
youi  confidence  and  friendship." 

His  voice  broke  so  badly  that  he  was  unable  to 
speak,  and  the  painfulness  of  this  strange  little  scene 
was  almost  more  than  those  young  people  could  bear. 
It  hurt  them  enough  to  stand  facing  a  man  who 
opened  his  soul  for  them  to  gaze  into,  especially  when 
that  man  was  their  father.  It  was  dreadful  to  see  him 
blinded  by  tears  in  the  middle  of  an  appeal  which  they 
all  realized  called  for  such  extreme  courage  and 
strength  of  character  to  make. 

They  all  wanted  to  do  something  to  help  him  and 
force  him  out  of  a  humbleness  that  made  them  hor- 
ribly self-conscious.  It  was  Peter  who  did  it.  With 
two  strides  he  stood  at  the  Doctor's  side  and  put  his 
arms  round  his  shoulder. 

The  Doctor  looked  up  into  the  face  of  the  great 
big,  tender  fellow,  whose  eyes  were  eloquent,  and 
smiled.  Then  he  found  his  voice  again  and  forced 
himself  to  the  bitter  end  of  what  he  had  determined  to 
say.  "  Something  in  the  way  you've  all  treated  me 
since  Peter  has  been  ill,"  he  said,  "  has  given  me  hope. 
That's  why  I  put  myself  in  your  hands,  my  dears. 
Shall  we  make  a  new  beginning?  Will  you  take  me 
into  your  friendship?  Will  you  all  give  me  another 
chance?  " 

With  a  little  cry  from  her  heart  Belle  went  forward 
and  put  her  arms  round  her  father's  neck,  and  Ethel, 
with  hot  tears  running  down  her  face,  crept  up  to 


352        THE  SINS  OF  THE  CHILDREN 

him  and  put  one  of  his  hands  to  her  lips.  Graham 
bent  over  the  other,  which  he  held  tight,  and  Peter, 
who  had  longed  for  this  moment  through  all  his  ill- 
ness, didn't  give  a  curse  who  heard,  his  voice  break, 
patted  the  Doctor  on  the  back,  and  said :  "  Dear  old 
man,  my  dear  old  father!  "  over  and  over  again. 


THE    END 


Books  by  Cosmo  Hamilton 
The  Blindness  of  Virtue 

"  A  plea  to  mothers  to  tell  their  daughters  frankly  all  the 
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cretion through  innocence.  Its  characters  are  uncommonly 
well  drawn  and  might  have  stepped  out  of  life." — New  York 
Evening  Sun. 

"  A  beautiful  piece  of  work  dealing  with  a  stupendously 
difficult  subject  with  the  most  dexterous  blending  of  delicacy, 
dramatic  strength  and  wholesome  candor." — London  Daily 
Chronicle. 

307  Pages.      $  1. 3  5  net. 


The  Miracle  of  Love 

"  One  of  the  most  notable  novels  of  the  year,  well  worth 
reading  by  those  who  are  seeking  more  than  a  pleasant  hour, 
but  wholly  delightful  merely  as  a  story." — New  Haven 
Register. 

"  It  is  a  fine,  well  told  and  purposeful  tale,  with  brilliant 
and  quotable  passages." — Detroit  Free  Press. 
325  Pages.      $1.35  net. 


The  Door  That  Has  No  Key 

"A  work  of  genuine  power;  it  is  impossible  to  read  it 
unmoved." — Providence  'Journal. 

"A  novel  to  re-read  and  preserve.  A  wonderful  piece  of 
work,  alive  with  emotion." — London  World. 

"  Discusses  marriage  and  divorce.  With  its  brilliant  char- 
acteristics it  is  a  notable  novel." — New  York  Evening  Sun. 
324  Pages.  $1.35  net. 

LITTLE,  BROWN  fcf  CO.,  Publishers,  BOSTON 


Books  by  Cosmo  Hamilton 
The  Blindness  of  Virtue 

A  PLAY  IN  FOUR  ACTS 

In  this  drama  of  two  girls'  careers  Mr.  Hamil- 
ton shows  powerfully  just  how  far  innocence, 
that  is  only  ignorance,  is  a  protection.  He 
levels  the  finger  of  accusation  against  parents 
whose  cowardice  of  silence,  masquerading  as  re- 
finement, threatens  ruin  in  their  children's  lives. 

"It  is  the  biggest  sermon  on  the  subject  that  has  ever 
been  preached." — Dorothy  Dix. 

126  Pages.      $1.00  net. 


A  Plea  for  the  Younger 
Generation 

"It  is  a  little  bomb  which  any  one  at  all  interested  in 
children  —  parent,  teacher,  eugenist — would  do  well  to  read 
and  consider.  It  is  written  with  the  glow  of  conviction  and 
there  is  merit  in  it  from  cover  to  cover." — Chicago  Tribune. 

41  It  is  a  very  small  book,  but  into  its  compass  the  author 
contrives  to  say  nearly  all  that  is  worth  while  on  lthe 
tragedy  of  half  truths'  on  sex  matters  when  they  are  told 
to  children." — San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

*6mo.      75  cents  net. 

LITTLE,  BROWN  fc?  CO.,  Publishers,  BOSTON 


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